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PSYCHOLOGY 

PERSONAL  and  ESSENTIAL 


H.  C.  SHEPPARD 


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PSYCHOLOGY: 
PERSONAL  and  ESSENTIAL 

BY 
H.  C.  SHEPPARD 


Published  by 

J.  F.  ROWNY  PRESS 

Los  Angeles     . 


Copyright,  1920 

by 
H.  C.  SHEPPARD 

Los  Angeles 
Cal. 


INTRODUCTORY 

ARE  YOU  THINKING?  Undoubtedly  you  are.  Some  think 
only  "after  a  fashion;"  still,  even  that  is  thinking. 

ARE  YOU  ALIVE?  ARE  YOU  LIVING?  Surely  NOT 
"only  after  a  fashion!" 

LIFE  AND  THOUGHT,  broadly  are  a  Search— For  What? 
Health?  Wealth?  Power?  Wisdom?  Beauty?  Charm? 

All  these,  PLUS  unbounded  genius,  are  either  awake  in  you, 
asleep  in  you,  or  dreaming  in  you.  To  search,  find  and  awaken, 
KNOW  YOUR  MIND— KNOW  YOUR  INSTRUMENTS. 

This  tuition  is  not  made  to  dazzle  you  like  a  movie  drama — 
to  stimulate  while  it  lasts,  but  quickly  to  fade  from  mind. 

It  will  not  beglitter  and  bedevil  you  with  what  this  or  the 
other  Tom,  Dick,  or  Harry  among  the  blatant  may  have  SAID 
about  Success. 

It  will  not  conceal  lack  of  tuition  with  displays  of  fictitious 
air  castles  intended  to  derail  attention  from  the  main  issue — the 
achievement  of  a  Successful  and  Happy  Life  HERE  AND  NOW. 

It  will  show  why  the  successful  "are  there;"  better  still,  it 
shows  you  how  you  yourself  can  and  must  become  a  success,  and 
improve  your  community  by  vitalizing  your  own  type.  A  greaf 
success  of  your  very  type  is  needed  or  you  would  not  be  here. 

It  does  make  you  familiar  with  plans  and  tools,  so  that  your 
purposes  can  be  achieved,  then  sets  you  to  work  building  the  real 
castle  of  your  own  choosing. 

It  encourages  discarding  of  opinions  and  convictions  when- 
ever facts  and  laws  can  be  put  in  their  place.  Briefly,  it  shows 
you  how  you  can  achieve  and  Enjoy  Active,  Buoyant  Life  by 
working  with  facts  and  laws  of  mind  as  your  secret  animating 
sources  of  energy — instead  of  opinions,  convictions,  and  fables. 
It  shows  how  you  can  make  Success,  Personal  Attractiveness  and 
Health  AUTOMATIC  and  HABITUAL,  and  the  gleaning  of  Wis- 
dom INTELLIGENT,  ACCURATE  and  INTUITIONAL. 

This  conforms  with  what  Plotinus  said  almost  two  thousand 
years  ago,  that  Life  and  Knowledge  have  three  degrees — Opinion, 
Science,  Illumination. 

4.14744 


LESSON  I. 
"LET  THERE  BE  HEALTH" 

WE  SHOULD  like  to  see  a  knowledge  of  psychology  so 
prevalent  that  the  word  would  need  no  explanation. 
Psyche,  of  course,  means  soul,  and  logos  means  rec- 
ord, discourse  or  wisdom.     Psychology  therefore  means  the 
discourse,  record  and  wisdom  of  the  soul.    We  do  not  possess 
souls.     We  are  souls.    Hence  the  study  of  psychology  is  soul 
study  or  self-study.    We  should  learn  to  think  ourselves  to  be 
souls  building  and  then  inhabiting  bodies  we  have  built.     This 
releases  us  at  the  start  from  allowing  the  condition  of  the  body 
to  play  ducks  and  drakes  with  our  poise. 

No  line  of  distinction  need  be  drawn  between  the  names 
mind  and  soul.  Splitting  hairs  might  impede  the  liberation 
intended  for  every  one  who  reads  these  chapters,  from  self- 
suppression  and  mental  confinement.  There  are  practical 
values  and  practical  principles  in  psychology;  it  is  better  to 
have  the  reader  swing  into  an  applicable  conception  of  the  sub- 
ject than  into  a  hair-splitting  one. 

Most  people  are  so  hypnotized  with  a  belief,  admitted  or 
unadmitted,  that  the  bodily  condition  is  imposed  by  something 
extraneous  to  themselves,  that  much  of  the  best  tuition  along 
these  lines,  even  if  they  themselves  seek  it,  falls  flat  with  them. 
The  bodily  condition  is  no  more  and  no  less  than  an  outward 
expression  or  reflection  of  the  state  of  mind.  You  may  not 
admit  an  impaired  state  of  mind.  That  merely  means  the  im- 
pairment is  deeper  than  any  state  you  can  recognize.  It  means 
that  some  fundamental  attitude  of  mind  or  character,  unaware 
to  yourself,  is  not  in  line  with  evolutionary  law.  It  can  be  found 
by  Analysis  and  can  be  corrected  by  Suggestion.  Analysis  and 
Suggestion  are  two  great  tools  of  Psychology,  to  be  explained 
later  in  this  book.  A  healthy  mind  or  soul  cannot  tolerate  an 
impaired  body;  automatically  and  in  the  long  run,  it  always 
rebuilds  according  to  its  own  innate  state. 

7 


8  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

Some  folks  have  claimed  to  be  perturbed  that  psychology 
may  trespass  on  religious  beliefs,  which  of  course  is  beside  the 
point.  Psychology  does  no  such  thing,  any  more  than  does  the 
art  of  photography  or  the  science  of  mathematics.  Yet  the 
expression  of  such  a  fear  or  objection  often  can  be  taken  as 
mental  laziness  disguised.  It  is  a  trite  observation  of  psychol- 
ogists that  persons  mentally  and  physically  lazy  will  not  hesi- 
tate to  draw  down  divinity  itself  by  corkscrew  processes  of 
reasoning,  to  defend  an  otherwise  reprehensible  attitude. 
There  are  fundamental  verities  in  religion  which  psychology 
and  science  reverence  with  a  depth  of  understanding  unknown 
to  that  brand  of  pietist.  If  you  have  no  faith,  psychology 
will  aid  you  to  reestablish  it  within  yourself;  you  could  not  have 
been  born  if  you  did  not  have  it.  If  you  have  FAITH,  psy- 
chology will  strengthen  it. 

As  the  proportions  of  this  outline  of  psychology  permit, 
we  shall  take  up  the  specific  study  of  Mind  in  its  objective  and 
subconscious  phases,  and  of  the  laws,  powers  and  possibilities 
of  mind.  This  lesson  is  devoted  to  the  subject  of  bodily 
health.  No  study  of  the  body  or  any  other  phase  of  man's 
being  is  independent  of  mental  law.  Some  scholar,  who  evi- 
dently had  deep  insight,  once  called  the  body  but  a  "function 
of  mind."  If  that  is  remembered,  the  student,  with  further 
application,  should  find  superb  health  not  only  accessible,  but 
should  also  be  able  to  make  it  habitual  with  himself.  Superb 
and  abounding  health  should  always  go  with  real  efficiency. 
All  of  us  like  to  imagine  that  it  always  should  be  so.  Yet  we 
see  well  organized  minds,  capable  men  and  women,  genial  and 
competent  persons  getting  along  ever  so  often  the  best  they 
may,  without  that  basis. 

Why  is  this? 

Is  there  a  way  out?     Racially?     Individually? 

Wherever  there  is  inattention,  there  also  is  deterioration. 
The  kitchen  itself  teaches  that  when  something  is  not  "attended 
to"  it  spoils.  For  the  past  century  we  have  been  riveting  our 
attention  to  machines,  systems,  and  to  material  things  in  gen- 
eral. We  have,  for  instance,  established  government  depart- 
ments to  facilitate  the  raising  of  wheat,  or  of  hogs.  And  we 
do  have  splendid  wheat  and  superb  hogs.  We  have  built 
superb  systems  and  edifices,  while  we  ourselves  all  that  time 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  9 

have  been  deteriorating  for  lack  of  attention.  So  we  have  no 
government  departments  to  facilitate  human  health  and  to 
promote  happiness.  We  would  take  such  a  department  as  a 
fit  subject  for  a  comic  opera  plot,  very  much  as  the  Spartans 
or  the  Greeks  and  other  splendidly  embodied  races  might  have 
poked  fun  at  a  hog-raising  department  if  they  had  ever  heard 
of  it.  So  today,  the  science  of  true  human  culture  is  not  so 
cushioned  with  facilities.  The  findings  of  the  late  military 
examination  boards  show  to  what  bad  extremes  such  lop-sided 
interest  may  lead.  It  has  required  an  unparalleled  holocaust  of 
blood  to  startle  us  from  a  two-thousand-year  nap.  Since 
Athens  we  have  ignored  man,  his  own  consciousness,  the  bring- 
ing into  play  of  his  latent  powers.  We  have  twisted  around, 
as  a  palliative  for  our  own  laziness,  one  of  the  most  signifi- 
cant psychological  phrases  in  our  own  scriptures,  from  "Thy 
Kingdom  Come," — to  "No,  I'd  rather  sicken,  stay  sick,  die, 
or  get  shot  and  go  TO  Thy  Kingdom."  We  have  paid  little 
or  no  attention  to  the  existence  of  laws  by  which  development 
and  growth  of  the  human  species  must  proceed.  At  last  hu- 
manity has  elevated  an  eyebrow  in  mild  astonishment.  It 
•required  no  less  a  cataclysm  than  a  world  war  to  do  it  Lan- 
guidly man  surveys  himself,  mud,  blood  and  inefficiency,  and 
debates  whether  greater  things  even  than  his  "civilization" 
could  be  accomplished  if  he  were  to  swing  his  attention  around 
for  a  while  to  that  most  ancient  command,  "Man,  Know 
Thyself."  We  can  no  more  than  encourage  the  present  swing 
of  the  pendulum.  Where  a  half  century  ago  no  scientist 
viewed  any  psychic  or  spiritual  hypothesis  without  scorn  and 
contempt,  today  there  is  not  one  scientist  of  first  rank  in  the 
world  who  is  not  only  conversant  with  the  fundamental  psy- 
chological laws,  but  who  does  not  also  hold  such  laws  as 
underlying,  and,  in  fact,  controlling  the  universe  of  matter 
and  of  humanity. 

So  universal  a  subject  as  psychology  of  course  has  various 
and  absorbing  branches.  For  our  present  effort,  therefore,  we 
shall  have  to  sift  and  select.  We  will  choose  for  study  only 
those  features  which  can  be  applied  to  the  development  of 
human  personality,  to  an  improvement  in  its  efficiency.  Em- 
phasis should  be  laid  on  the  attainments  of  greater  capacity 
for  Life,  Love,  Activity,  Intelligence  and  Power,  here  and 


10  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

now,  but  not  to  the  exclusion  of  the  higher  psychic  and  spiritual 
demands. 

Let  us  cultivate  that  broad  tolerance  from  the  start,  so 
if  some  isolated  statement  may  startle  and  amaze  for  the  time, 
we  will  yet  know  that  before  the  course  is  completed  all  preju- 
dices and  doubts  will  have  been  resolved,  —  will  have  been 
sublimated — to  use  a  word  much  in  vogue  today, — into  perfect 
answers  for  whatever  questions  may  in  the  meantime  arise  in 
our  minds. 

IN  PURSUING  HEALTH,  PLEASE  RUN  IN  ONE  DIRECTION 
AT  A  TIME;  IF  POSSIBLE,  THE  RIGHT  ONE 

"What  would  I  be  willing  to  give" — asks  Dr.  Watson 
S.  Rankin,  president  of  the  American  Public  Health  Associa- 
tion, "for  something  in  a  bottle  that  carried  with  it  the  absolute 
guarantee  that  my  vitality,  my  strength,  bodily  and  mental,  my 
efficiency,  would  be  increased  from  five  to  ten  per  cent  a  year?" 
Indeed,  Dr.  Rankin  shows  sanely  and  conclusively  in  the  prog- 
ress of  his  talk  that  no  such  bottle  is  available;  that  the  loss  of 
vitality  does  not  take  place  suddenly,  and  that  its  conservation 
and  increase  is  mostly  up  to  the  amount  of  conscious  effort 
which  the  individual  is  willing  to  pay  for  it.  Yet  the  material 
views  with  which  we  have  saturated  ourselves  thru  several 
generations  still  makes  of  the  many — a  community  of  drug- 
store haunters.  This  helps  in  some  ways  undoubtedly, — but 
not  in  the  ways  usually  imagined.  It  helps  patent  medicine 
millionaires  to  winter  in  Florida  or  in  Pasadena,  but  it  does 
not  add  to  the  sum  total  of  health.  Sooner  or  later  the  drug- 
store haunter  must  learn  to  face  the  fact;  he  must  learn  that 
the  contents  of  the  bottle  he  is  seeking  cannot  be  bought  with 
money.  It  can  be  bought  only  by  readjustment  of  his  own 
thinking,  and  that  to  such  a  fundamental  and  pervasive  extent 
that  the  bodily  functions  cannot  help  but  follow  suit. 

Let  us  take  a  group  of  seventy-one  typical  Americans. 
Dr.  Rankin  says  that  out  of  this  group  one  will  die  within  the 
year.  Only  thirteen  will  be  rated  as  in  practically  perfect 
health,  with  90  per  cent,  or  more  of  efficiency;  25  will  have 
"good  health,"  with  from  70  to  90  per  cent,  of  vitality;  just 
below  them  in  healthfulness,  more  or  less  impaired,  are  30 
individuals,  still  out  of  the  original  group  of  71.  The  re- 
mainder will  comprise  persons  in  various  stages  of  imperfect 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  11 

health,  including  two  who  are  in  bed  all  the  time  and  the  one 
who  is  dead.  Translated  into  terms  of  the  whole  population, 
there  are  about  1,500,000  deaths  annually,  but  there  are  some 
three  millions  who  are  sick  all  the  time,  while  there  are  45,- 
000,000  in  the  "zone  of  impairment."  These  forty-five  mil- 
lions would  give  freely  of  their  substance  if  health  could  be 
bought  for  cash.  Most  of  them  would  not  pay  the  equivalent 
in  personal  effort.  Few  of  them  see  or  care  to  pay  attention 
to  such  proffers  as  are  contained  within  the  pages  of  this  book 
—simple,  readily  understood  measures  for  health,  easily 
within  the  reach  of  all.  The  partly  efficient  division  already 
includes  1  million  out  of  the  45,  "victims  of  tuberculosis,  not 
yet  bedridden,  but  sowing  the  seeds  of  death  in  new  soil." 

Coming  to  the  revelations  disclosed  by  the  draft,  38  per 
cent,  of  those  rejected  were  of  the  dubious  "good  health" 
classification,  enjoying  from  a  scant  70  per  cent,  to  a  possible 
90  per  cent,  of  full  vitality.  Included  among  them  were  those 
afflicted  with  serious  maladies  in  their  early  stages,  and  a  still 
larger  company  suffering  from  mild  forms  of  intemperance, 
such  as  over-eating  and  consequent  undernourishment  or  "mal- 
nutrition," under-sleeping  and  lack  of  sufficient  exercise.  Let 
us  remember  that  as  we  pass  sage  remarks  about  them  we  are 
merely  shifting  and  evading.  The  sage  remarks  apply  to  the 
person  who  speaks  them.  We  will  "get  somewhere"  only 
when  we  realize  that  in  studying  any  appreciable  sector  of 
humanity  we  are  indeed  and  in  truth  studying  ourselves.  For 
it  is  exactly  in  this  dubious  "good  health"  column  that  we 
would  find  many  a  capable  business  man.  Often  he  is  the  best 
example  of  ourselves  that  we  have  to  show.  The  Sunday 
edition  of  the  local  newspaper  will  often  print  his  picture,  and 
an  enthusiastically  careful  "blurb,"  presumed  to  be  a  story  of 
his  life.  In  all,  it  is  supposed  to  act  as  an  "ikon"  of  success 
for  the  growing  boy  to  read,  remember  and  copy  after.  Inves- 
tigation would  often  dispel  all  mystery  as  to  why  the  otherwise 
careful  and  capable  man  is  in  the  "dubious"  list.  If  we  could 
watch  some  such  criterion  of  perfection,  more  than  likely  we 
would  see  him  hurrying  nervously  thru  breakfast,  scurrying 
next  to  his  garage  or  commutation  train,  hurrying  thru  his 
morning's  routine,  the  walls  of  the  office  showing  mottoes  to 
"hurry,"  and  to  "do  it  now."  We'd  see  him  snatching  a  quick 


12  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

lunch  at  noon  so  that  nothing  will  interfere  with  his  hurry  to 
get  back  to  the  office.  Later  we  would  see  him  hurried  and 
jostled  in  traffic  and  in  crowds.  He  is  going  home.  But 
again,  the  supper  must  be  hurried,  for  there  the  evening  is 
already  "dated."  If  the  date  is  for  an  amusement,  considering 
the  man's  state  of  mind  by  this  time, — it  must  prove  at  best 
but  distraction.  It  may  as  well  be  a  business  engagement— 
and  often  it  is.  Then  the  ride  home  at  last.  Probably  there  is 
even  the  common  tho7  tragic  attempt  to  hurry  sleep — which 
can't  be  done.  All  this  that  he  might  hurry  to  get  up  in  the 
morning. and  hurry  thru  breakfast  once  more.  What  now  of 
the  boy  reading  the  "blurb"  entitled:  "Series  41144;  Our 
Prominent  Citizens;  Their  Stories  of  Success."  Probably  the 
youngster  is  already  hampered  by  a  faulty  dietary,  which  as 
yet  he  trusts.  Probably  a  murderous  home  psychology  is  being 
inflicted  on  him  by  a  doting  mother,  and  no  psychology  at  all 
by  a  business-engrossed  father.  This  he  is  beginning  to  mis- 
trust just  a  trifle.  He  says  nothing.  But  if  he  be  wise,  the  boy 
will  be  doing  a  lot  of  silent  speculation.  That  speculation  will 
be  filled  with  doubt  and  foreboding  what  would  become  of  him 
if  he  really  did  take  the  newspaper's  advice  and  use  the  business 
man  pictured,  as  a  complete  model  for  his  own  life. 
THOU  SHALT  NOT  KILL 

To  take  life  by  carelessness  or  omission  is  2d  degree  mur- 
der legally,  1st  degree  murder  morally.  Indifference  to  one's 
own  health  is  not  at  all  removed  from  indifference  to  the  health 
of  others.  It  is  "the  public  be  damned  attitude ;"  it  is  sustained 
violation  of  the  commandment,  "Thou  shalt  not  kill."  Public 
health  is  a  private  concern;  private  health  is  a  public  concern. 
No  one  is  too  dull-witted  to  understand  this  simple  statement. 
Selfishness  will  of  course  stand  in  the  way  of  applying  it.  But 
its  application  is  the  only  remedy,  and  it  lies  in  our  own  hands. 
The  price  of  health  is  not  alone  individual  care,  but  participa- 
tion as  well  in  health  matters  of  public  moment.  Nature  is 
teaching  us  a  mild  lesson  in  this  direction,  which  we  persist- 
ently take  in  a  manner  that  is  drastic  beyond  all  bounds.  We 
"miss"-take  it.  The  sloven,  for  instance,  learns  nothing  from 
his  mistake;  he  tolerates  filth,  contracts  a  disease,  is  relieved 
by  a  charitable  practitioner  or  clinic,  and  returns  to  his  en- 
trenchment of  filth  to  menace  the  community.  The  plutocrat 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  13 

who  not  only  tolerates,  but  often  helps  to  perpetuate  the  neigh- 
boring disease-fester  of  slums,  thereafter  also  makes  a  mistake 
in  falsely  imagining  that  he  can  go  to  a  practitioner  or  doctor 
and  buy  immunity  for  himself  or  his  sons  and  daughters.  He 
is  likewise  deceived  by  some  temporary  relief  into  resuming  his 
entrenchment.  In  ignoring  the  sources  of  his  own  comfort 
and  competence,  he  is  no  less  a  threat  to  his  own  and  the  com- 
munity health  than  is  the  most  abjectly  ignorant  sloven. 

During  an  epidemic  we  quit  pretending  that  we  cannot 
understand  these  simple  rules  against  selfishness.  We  will  do 
the  obviously  right  and  simple  thing  if  we  are  sufficiently 
mauled  and  shocked, — not  otherwise.  Can  the  well-intentioned 
individual  do  anything  to  improve  this  situation,  besides  nursing 
his  good  intentions?  Yes.  Try  tof  remember  this  preliminary 
table  of 
THE  TEN  ENCOURAGEMENTS — 

I.  If  unwell,  desire  health  so  systematically  and  so  much 
that  you  will  have  no  mental  energy  left  with  which  to 
worry  about  any  disorder  you  may  have.  Translate 
the  desire  into  effort  and  action  whenever  possible. 
Ways  for  improvement  and  health  will  present  them- 
selves. 

II.  Whether  well  or  unwell,  work  to  make  sickness  and 
epidemics  unpopular;  work  to  make  health  contagious, 
popular,  fashionable,  desirable,  and  available  to  all  who 
sufficiently  desire  it. 

III.  Enact,    enforce   and   observe  laws   concerning  commu- 
nicable disease  and  child  hygiene. 

IV.  Enact,  enforce  and  observe  laws  to  stamp  out  the  last 
criminal  blots  of  child  slavery  wherever  they  still  befoul 
the  map. 

V.  Encourage  only  those  practitioners  and  physicians 
who  emphasize  diet,  exercise  and  natural  recuperation 
much,  and  who  use  drugs  and  surgery  only  when  patients 
(not  the  bank  accounts  of  the  practitioners)  are  in 
extremis. 

VI.  Realize  and  help  others  to  realize  that  psychological  or 
mental  law  ultimately  shapes  the  physical  form  and 
condition;  that  health  or  disease  are  symptoms  of 
chronic  tho'  often  somewhat  obscure  mental  attitudes. 


14  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

VII.  Encourage  in  yourself  and  others  realization  of  the  fact 
that  self-study,  self-training  and  self-culture  are  the  only 
forms  of  currency  with  which  health  and  true  growth 
can  be  bought.  Money  payment  is  symbolic;  don't  stop 
at  the  symbol. 

VIII.  Don't  uOh!"  "Ah!"  and  gush  over  this  book  or  any- 
thing else ;  discourage  undefined  thought.  Exercise  feel- 
ing only  in  connection  with  things  that  are  worth  it. 
Find  such  things.  You  can  if  you  yourself  are  worthy. 
IX*.  Dig  in  and  stir  up  the  fields  of  indifference  in  the  race- 
consciousness;  help  to  bring  about  a  universal  realiza- 
tion of  the  fact  that  health  and  disease,  fortune  and  mis- 
fortune are  self-made,  and  that  the  making  starts  with 
thought. 

X.  Specialize  in  persuading  that  individual  effort  be  used 
for  currency  as  readily  and  cheerfully  as  payments  are 
made  for  other  less  valuable  objects  where  the  price  is 
translated  into  dollars  and  paid  in  a  lump  sum. 

These  are  some  ways  of  translating  your  desires  into 
effort.     In  practicing  them,  soon  enough  you  can  become  a 
veritable  dynamo  for  the  increase  of  vital  efficiency  of  those 
around  you,  by  no  means  excluding  yourself. 
THE  BEST  STUDY  OF  MANKIND  Is  YOURSELF 

There  is  but  ONE  thing  to  study,  to  know  about,  to 
"tune-up-to,"  in  order  to  improve  one's  health,  efficiency  and 
personality,  and  thereby  help  in  the  development  of  a  perfect 
race :  It  is  your  own  mind.  As  you  are  mind  or  soul,  the 
physical  machine  notwithstanding, — it  is  yourself.  In  a  larger 
sense, — when  studying  all  of  psychology,  you  are  always  learn- 
ing about  yourself. 

We  find  three  factors  which  undoubtedly  influence  our 
mental  and  soul  attitudes  during  life.  These  are : 

1.  Heredity, 

2.  Prenatal  Influence, 

3.  Subsequent  experience  and  training. 

Someone  may  ask,  How  am  I  to  change  the  influence  of 
these  ?  They  can  be  changed  and  improved  by  applied  psychol- 
ogy. But  a  greater  object  even  than  that  is  so  to  enlighten  the 
race-mind  that  every  newcomer  into  our  world  will  be  certain 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  15 

of  the  best  in  regard  to  these  three  factors.  Heredity  itself  is 
peculiarly  in  the  province  of  psychology.  We  see  that  the 
three  factors  mentioned  serve  to  develop  a  fundamental  atti- 
tude of  character,  and  are  the  hidden  springs  which  make  each 
individual  react  to  experience  and  to  life  itself  differently  from 
all  other  individuals.  What  science  could  be  greater  than  one 
which  can,  even  in  the  slightest  measure,  gain  control  of  these 
hidden  springs? 

All  human  beings  are  in  school.  On  the  other  hand,  no 
human  being  is  "all  here."  There  is  a  vast  phase  of  each  indi- 
vidual's mind,  it  seems,  which  never  comes  into  the  field  of  his 
awareness.  That  phase  is  the  subconscious  or  bigger  half  of 
his  mind.  It  is  the  phase  that  builded  the  body  in  the  first 
place.  If  it  seems  to  have  done  an  imperfect  job,  there  was 
something  to  hamper  it  among  the  three  features  of  heredity, 
prenatal  life, — or  some  violent  obstruction  developed  as  a  re- 
sult of  personal  experience.  The  latter  feature,  any  individual 
may  rectify  by  learning  and  applying  the  simple  and  correct 
psychological  principles.  He  can  modify  and  improve  infin- 
itely the  influence  of  the  former  two — heredity  and  prenatal 
influence.  To  do  these  things,  in  fact,  is  a  great  part  of  the 
program  of  "studies"  in  which  he  must  perfect  himself  before 
he  can  graduate  from  the  "school."  Not  to  be  interested  in 
the  science  of  life  is  a  sign  of  retarded  evolution, — more 
specifically,  a  sign  of  self-impairment. 

To  "do  the  lesson"  most  easily,  it  is  necessary  for  the 
individual  to  realize  that  somewhere  in  his  unplumbed  psychic 
self,  the  subconscious  mind  has  imprinted  within  it  the  picture 
of  a  perfect  human  being, — perfect  with  you  according  to  your 
type.  The  brain  is  still  in  the  process  of  evolving, — not  yet 
perfect.  Hence  with  it  there  is  no  possibility  of  forming  a 
real  picture  of  perfection.  Therefore,  psychologists  have 
sometimes  called  this  real  subconscious  design  of  a  perfect  man 
or  woman  the  "divine"  image.  That  might  serve  for  a  name, 
except  that  with  most  people  the  mention  of  such  a  word  as 
"divine"  acts  as  a  signal  to  quit  thinking.  It  is  wise  to  drop 
those  words  which  no  longer  challenge  our  aggressive  interest, 
and  to  substitute  such  as  do.  After  all,  it  is  the  idea,  the  prin- 
ciple and  the  reality  that  we  want;  words  or  names  are  of  no 
importance. 


16  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

That  perfect  plan  or  picture  of  what  you  should  strive  to 
be  is  the  thing  which  every  cell  and  automatic  function  in  your 
body  and  being  is  working  ably  to  bring  into  substantial  reality 
for  you.  You  will  find  that  by  acquirement  and  application 
of  psychological  knowledge,  you  will  be  in  better  position  to  let 
them  work  out  this  design  unimpeded  and  unimpaired. 

Thru  psychology  you  will  find  how  to  remove  and  to  coun- 
teract any  adverse  impediments  placed  upon  your  subconscious 
"picture  of  perfection,"  by  heredity,  prenatal  influence  and 
personal  experience. 

All  the  bodily  and  psychic  automatisms  are  tremendously 
susceptible  to  heredity  and  the  other  two  factors.  But  psy- 
chology tells  us  that  all  these  things,  when  acting,  act  as 
bundles  of  mental  energy,  and  therefore  by  mental  law.  Your 
mental  attitude  of  this  year  or*  this  minute  is  just  as  much  a 
bundle  of  mental  energy.  It  may  be  that  both  with  old  and 
with  new  bundles  the  kind  of  application  of  mental  law  has 
been  adverse  to  your  human  wrelfare.  Then  the  right  and 
helpful  application  will  open  to  you  thru  a  knowledge  of  the 
facts  and  laws  which  you  are  now  reading. 

This  ensemble  of  facts,  conclusions  and  laws,  which  con- 
stitutes our  present  knowledge  of  psychology,  is  the  entering 
wedge  to  permanent  improvement,  self-development  and  ulti- 
mate perfection,  not  only  in  health,  poise  and  efficiency,  but 
finally  into  the  acquirement  of  powers  now  hardly  guessed  or 
dreamed  of  by  man.  In  that  part  of  our  tuition  where  "psychic 
faculties"  fall  into  the  sequence,  it  will  be  demonstrated  how 
psychological  law  may  be  invoked  to  improve  and  strengthen 
the  will,  the  reason,  the  memory,  the  emotions,  and  also  that 
greatest  single  feature  in  the  category  of  powers,  human  or 
"divine," — the  Imagination. 

Some  day,  as  this  knowledge  spreads,  it  will  be  seen  that 
heredity,  prenatal  influence  and  even  personal  thought  resulting 
from  drastic  experience,  need  not  be  the  formidable  bugaboos 
they  now  seem  to  be.  True  enough,  so  long  as  we  are  ignorant 
and  unable  to  use  our  own  powers,  these  features  are  the  causes 
of  practically  the  sum  total  of  our  miseries.  But  the  evolution 
of  the  you,  the  individual,  no  less  surely  than  the  evolution  of 
the  race,  can  surely  be  hastened  by  self-study,  and  by  the  con- 
structive application  of  laws  which  we  may  discover  by  that 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  17 

process.  It  is  the  only  sure  means;  if  its  acceptance  and  appli- 
cation spreads,  then  only  do  we  approach  a  real  and  never- 
ending  millenium  of  a  civilization  that  will  be  supreme,  and  not 
a  cringing  apology  for  itself  such  as  the  present.  An  Olympic 
image  of  perfect  man  will  dominate  life;  gods  of  beauty  and 
power  will  reign  supreme  in  the  hearts  of  men. 

In  the  main  people  are  yet  blindly  and  tragically  ignorant 
of  the  one  thing  they  should  know, — the  tremendous  influence 
which  Mind,  their  own  mind,  has  over  their  bodies.  They 
have  totally  forgotten  that  they  are  the  visible  expressions  of 
their  own  mental  attitudes, — that  their  thoughts  and  dreams, 
night  and  day,  make  them  what  they  are.  They  forget  that 
children  are  as  they  are,  and  often  cannot  find  the  ability  to 
grow  outside  the  bents  given  them  by  suggestions  and  impres- 
sions while  yet  unborn,  or  during  infancy.  We  all  need  to  be 
reminded  that  life  and  destiny  are  what  we  make  them  by  our 
casual  thoughts,  by  our  intense  thoughts,  and  by  our  lack  of 
thoughts. 
RACIAL  DEVELOPMENT 

Activity  and  work,  selfishness  disregarded,  are  the  only 
forms  of  worship  you  approve  in  yourself  during  your  best 
moments.  Those  are  the  moments,  if  ever,  that  you  are  ex- 
periencing a  reflection  of  higher  (or  if  you  prefer — "divine") 
guidance  and  approval. 

This  all  should  apply  to  personal  and  racial  improvement. 
We  must  work  actively  for  it;  that  means  we  should  dare  to 
experiment  in  order  to  find  out  laws,  and  then  again  dare  to 
apply  our  findings. 

Look  at  Nature,  which  someone  has  called  The  Garment 
of  God.  All  about  us  we  see  where  outside  his  own  clan  man 
has  improved  things  by  adding  to — where  Nature  left  off. 
He  has  incurred  no  "divine"  disapproval  by  that  course,  but, 
on  the  contrary,  has  been  richly  blessed  for  it.  A  god  evi- 
dently never  objects  to  having  his  garments  altered  by  man  so 
the  latter  may  use  them. 

Man  placed  his  attention  on  fruits  and  vegetables.  In 
early  Aryan  and  Persian  times  he  took  a  plant  a  little  worse 
than  our  present  thorn-rose,  tampered  with  it,  and  today  that 
thorny  shrub  is  our  Hood  River  Apple.  The  history  of  our 
great  sunny  and  seedless  orange  is  similar,  even  more  recent. 


18  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

A  wild  little  hedge  vine  has  thus  been  made  into  our  American 
Beauty  rose. 

Nature  only  contained  the  wild  dog  or  wolf,  the  wildcat 
and  the  wild  horse.  Man,  again,  by  sundry  attempts  at  domes- 
ticating members  of  these  animal  tribes,  plus  judicious  inter- 
ference even  in  their  own  generative  selections,  has  produced 
those  thorobreds  which  now  we  enjoy  for  utility  or  pleasure. 

With  plants,  birds  and  animals,  science  has  demonstrated 
that  selection,  care,  intelligence,  and  finally  an  applied  intuition 
resulting  from  these  (which  we  may  call  the  "psychology"  of 
the  thing) — the  superior  specimen  thus  evolved  becomes  so 
common  that  we  regard  it  as  always  having  been  with  us. 

Nature  unaided  produces  only  species.  Man  must  study 
and  labor  to  produce  specific  types  of  use  to  himself;  he  must 
himself  produce  the  superior  specimen. 

We  need  not  go  to  Malthus.  We  need  not  scan  the 
academic  fields.  We  can  go  to  any  neighboring  farm  and  see 
that  the  laws  of  natural  selection,  heredity,  prenatal  influence 
and  environment,  can  be  understood,  manipulated  and  im- 
proved. We  can  see  there  that  experimentation  need  not  be  an 
abomination.  Laws  can  be  discovered.  As  they  are  more  and 
more  completely  understood  and  applied,  the  program  more 
than  vindicates  itself  because  the  succeeding  generations  of  off- 
springs are  superior.  Today  we  are  using  what  we  recognize 
of  these  laws — with  our  livestock.  Therefore,  our  livestock 
today  is  the  best  in  the  history  of  the  world. 

Not  neglecting  the  psychic  and  spiritual  factors  involved, 
man,  some  day,  will  quit  his  foolish  disdain  of  these  same  laws 
in  his  own  case.  Up  to  the  present  time  man  has  allowed  un- 
controlled Nature, — that  is  to  say,  Nature,  hampered  with  the 
unattended  and  complacent  incrustations  of  human  ignorance, 
to  run  her  own  course  in  the  evolution  of  mankind.  Psychology 
means  to,  and  in  time,  surely  will  throw  light  on  this  problem. 

PERSONAL  DEVELOPMENT;  How  WE 
CAUSE  OUR  OWN  ILLNESSES 

Disease  is  better  understood  when  spelled  "dis"-ease, 
when  it  means  lack  of  ease,  physical,  psychic  or  mental.  It 
has  only  one  source,  which  is  the  sufferer's  state  of  mind.  How 
can  this  be  in  the  case  of  a  broken  limb?  The  carelessness,  or 
the  moment  of  inattention  which  preceded  it,  shows  that  the 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  19 

mind  had  to  "break"  before  the  leg  could.  It  requires  mental 
effort  of  some  sort  to  grasp  and  apply  even  physical  laws.  A 
balanced  diet  never  yet  helped  a  person  with  unbalanced  emo- 
tions and  a  floundering  mind.  Says  the  proverb:  Whiskey 
never  yet  made  a  drunkard;  vice  (a  mental  defect  always)  has 
made  many.  Intolerance  and  lack  of  balance  are  two  major 
vices.  Most  prohibitionists  have  both.  Drunkards  usually 
have  only  the  latter.  It  stands  to  reason  that  if  we  were  fully 
conversant  with  both  mental  and  physical  aspects  in  the  laws 
of  health  AND  APPLIED  them,  the  person  and  the  race 
would  become  at  once  physically  perfect.  There  is  a  physical 
side  to  consider  in  all  this.  It  is  a  mistake,  the  effects  of  which 
are  foolishly  suppressed  by  some,  entirely  to  ignore  application 
of  physical  measures.  Psychology  makes  the  use  of  physical 
measures  more  intelligent,  powerful  and  helpful.  One  of  the 
first  steps  in  real  mind  and  soul  growth  is  the  thorough  learn- 
ing NOT  TO  IGNORE  FACT,  and  NOT  TO  MISCONSTRUE  FACT 
EVEN  IF  YOUR  FAMILY,  YOUR  CULT  OR  DENOMINATION  ANI> 
THE  WHOLE  WORLD  ARE  ALL  DOING  SO. 

A  few  necessary  things  in  regard  to  health  must  be  taken 
up  from  an  angle  that  does  not  appear  psychological.  Yet 
nothing  is,  or  transpires,  but  has  its  effect  on  mind.  Psychology 
is  "built  up"  knowledge  concerning  such  effects.  At  first  blush 
some  parts  of  this  first  chapter  may  sound  "materialistic.*1 
Essentially,  however,  they  will  prove  themselves  as  sound  in- 
gredients of  a  broad  and  deep  psychology.  We  will  see,  for 
instance,  how  necessary  it  is  to  accomplish  the  habit  of  health. 
Habit  is  purely  a  psychological  or  mental  entity  brought  into 
being  by  your  own  thinking.  The  question  is,  how  may  we 
build  into  ourselves  such  habits  as  will  always  be  stimulating  us 
into  good  health?  We  have  already  despaired  of  buying  for 
money  the  "miraculous  bottle"  of  the  doctor  quoted.  Let  us- 
despair  also  of  those  sweeping  slogans  replete  with  mystery 
and  metaphysics,  which  some  people  use  to  veil  their  difficul- 
ties. The  answer  is  much  more  simple  than  all  that. 

IN  NINE  CASES  OUT  OF  TEN,  CLEANLINESS 
INSURES  HEALTH 

The  healthy  system  is  never  an  unclean  system.  The 
clean  constitution  is  healthy.  Disease,  as  shown,  has  only  one 
source  of  origin — mind.  But  the  grosser  symptoms  of  it  nf- 


20  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

tach  themselves  to  both  mind  and  body.  The  body  reflects  it 
as  internal  uncleanliness.  If  ignorance  and  neglect  are  main- 
tained after  that,  the  disordered  condition  may  become  com- 
plicated and  chronic. 

We  shun  or  ignore  persons  who  disobey  the  dictates  of 
good  breeding,  who  neglect  themselves  outwardly  in  point  of 
cleanliness.  Yet  self-neglect  as  regards  internal  cleanliness, 
not  so  visible,  does  not  receive  a  similar  condemnation  which 
it  richly  deserves.  Many  speak  glibly  of  their  bodies  being 
temples  for  the  indwelling:  of  the  holy  ghost.  Often  those 
very  individuals  will  be  found  too  lazy  to  apply  intelligent 
effort  at  least  to  have  healthy  digestive  and  intestinal  action. 
If  the  reeking  and  poisonous  bodily  condition  of  many  such 
individuals  were  as  apparent  as  their  well-groomed  exteriors, 
they  would  land  in  jail  forthwith;  no  evidence  of  any  misde- 
meanor but  that  would  justify  their  incarceration. 

WATER 

Further  on  we  shall  delve  somewhat  into  the  intelligence 
and  activity  of  the  cells  which  compose  the  tissues  and  flesh  of 
our  bodies.  Yet  at  this  point  it  will  be  wise  to  remember  to 
what  an  astonishing  extent  water  enters  as  an  ingredient  of  all 
these  minor  components  of  the  body.  The  cells  themselves, 
almost  in  a  strictly  literal  sense,  are  marine  animals.  The 
body,  without  an  inflow  of  fresh  water,  like  the  Great  Salt 
Lake,  or  the  Dead  Sea,  poisons  of  itself  the  life  of  its  cell  con- 
stituency. The  lives  in  water  want  fresh  water,  not  dead 
water.  Yet  Nature,  thru  the  neglect  of  many  persons  to  drink 
ample  quantities  of  fresh  water, — to  make  up  the  lack,  is 
forced  to  reabsorb  from  the  bowels  liquids  already  fouled  and 
intended  to  aid  in  the  sewerage  processes  of  elimination.  This 
is  often  a  prime  cause  of  "auto  intoxication,"  hardening  of  the 
arteries, — the  otherwise  quite  mythical  malady  called  "old 
age."  Coffee  or  tea  and  their  denatured  substitutes  cannot  be 
depended  upon  to  take  the  place  of  clean,  fresh  water,  and  the 
same  is  true  of  most  liquid  beverages.  Many  such,  it  is  true, — 
especially  fruit  juices  (if  one  is  sure  they  are  not  "faked"  in 
manufacture)  may  be  wholesome  tonics;  but  for  cell-rejuvena- 
tion and  renovation,  why  not  do  the  obvious, — quit  arguing  or 
"disliking"  water,  and  instead  drink  plenty  of  it?  Children,  in 
the  main,  obey  their  instincts  in  this  regard  generously,  and  are 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  21 

rewarded  just  as  generously  with  that  vigor  which  we  take  to 
be  the  child's  due. 

With  adults  it  becomes  practically  necessary  to  lay  down 
some  rule.  In  the  majority  of  instances,  it  would  be  well  if 
that  rule  were  made  for  a  half,  or  even  whole,  tumbler-full  of 
water  every  hour  of  the  active  day.  Thruout  this  study  we 
shall  be  learning  how  enormous  an  influence  the  mental  attitude 
exercised  toward  every  physical  act  has  on  the  subconscious 
self,  with  a  consequent  reaction  on  the  body.  It  is  not  too 
early,  however,  to  say  this  in  regard  to  the  drinking  of  water : 
Get  a  supply  which  your  common  sense  (or  the  common  sense 
of  someone  else,  if  you  have  none)  tells  you  is  clean,  fresh, 
and  dependable.  Such  fundamentals  of  physical  life,  as  water, 
must  be  taken  with  utter  confidence.  If  you  have  lost  it,  regain 
it  in  regard  to  all  the  essential  fundamentals,  not  only  of  the 
physical  life,  but  of  the  mental  life  as  well.  Then  train  your- 
self from  the  core  of  your  soul  to  feel  that  water  is  life-giving, 
rejuvenating, — a  pure  tonic  without  adverse  reaction.  If  you 
will  do  this  seven  or  eight  times  a  day  for  a  week,  you  will 
have  established  the  habit  of  deriving  good  mental  influence 
from  your  hourly  tipple  of  water  for  the  rest  of  your  life.  In- 
dulge it  from  that  time  on  as  a  permanent  and  pleasant  habit. 
If  you  take  it  as  a  painful  duty,  you  will  be  cheating  yourself 
out  of  more  than  half  the  benefit  it  could  otherwise  do  for 
your  bodily  health. 

CONSTIPATION 

Do  not  overdo  the  matter.  It  is  not  necessary  to  flush 
and  drown  the  system.  Use  sense.  Develop  it  as  the  most 
valuable  counter-habit  to  the  constipation  habit, — the  prolific 
root  of  many  "filth  diseases."  It  is  a  more  gentle  and  effective 
way  to  "bathe  internally"  than  the  enema  (rectal  injection  of 
warm  water  containing  a  trifle  of  castile  soap) — altho'  the 
enema  need  not  be  prohibited  if  the  filth  accumulation  is  unduly 
aggravated.  The  water  drinking  as  described  above  will  the 
sooner  warrant  that  injections  may  be  entirely  dispensed  with. 

In  pronounced  cases  of  faulty  elimination,  there  is  a  fur- 
ther item  to  practice  when  the  regime  of  drinking  more  water 
is  first  adopted.  Every  person  can  make  certain  movements 
with  the  abdominal  muscles  (which,  by  the  way,  are  remark- 
ably strong  even  in  the  weakest  bodies) — that  will  amount  to 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

"churning  the  stomach."  This  can  be  done  right  after  a 
tumbler  of  water  has  been  drunk,  and  even  during  the  process 
of  the  enema.  After  this,  lie  flat  on  the  back  on  the  floor  (the 
resilience  of  a  couch  or  bed  spoils  the  effect)  and  forcibly,  with 
the  aid  of  the  hands,  if  necessary,  bring  the  knees  up  to  touch 
the  abdomen.  Repeat  twenty  times  with  due  rest  intervals. 
This  will  often  bring  immediate  results. 

Most  cases,  however,  are  too  mild  to  require  this  last 
exercise.  With  such,  a  slow  but  thorough  squeezing  and  mas- 
saging of  the  upper  abdomen  and  its  sides  will  often  produce 
the  same  result,  provided  the  ?ystem  is  not  dry-rotting  for  lack 
of  water.  The  person  fulfilling  these  requirements  must  with 
it  all  demand  of  himself,  insist,  and  above  all  EXPECT  that 
the  eliminato-ry  functions  act  efficiently  and  that  they  com- 
mence at  once.  So  much  for  water. 

THE  CLEAN  SYSTEM  Is  THE  HEALTHY  SYSTEM 

Bathing,  external  or  internal,  alone,  cannot  keep  the  sys- 
tem clean.  If  the  mind  is  fouled,  the  cells  and  tissues  and 
organs  of  the  body  will  surely  reflect  its  condition.  Now,  it 
may  be  true  that  sensuality  and  prurient  desires  may  often  clog 
an  otherwise  good  mind.  But  these  "side-tracks"  are  but 
child's  play  when  compared  to  adverse  emotions,  such  as  Fear, 
Anxiety,  Envy,  Greed  and  Jealousy.  Indeed,  the  all  too  com- 
mon tendency  to  view  a  perfectly  necessary  function  and  its 
biological  expression  in  an  over-puritanical  or  prudish  manner 
is  often  in  the  first  place  the  cause  of  mental  filth  and  the  cor- 
responding destructive  emotionalism.  These  are  the  forms  of 
mental  action  which  defile  the  physical  system  as  surely  and 
much  more  poisonously  than  physical  constipation.  The  latter, 
itself,  from  a  psychological  point  of  view,  often  is  nothing 
more  than  one  of  the  minor  and  comparatively  harmless  effects 
produced  by  years  of  indulgence  in  such  emotions  and  attitudes. 
Sound  the  tocsin  of  cleanliness,  so  that  it  will  reverberate 
and  register  not  only  in  the  physical  habits,  but  thruout  the 
psychic  habits  as  well.  The  religious  aphorism  has  it  that 
"Cleanliness  is  akin  to  godliness."  Psychology  says  it  is  sure 
that  cleanliness  is  a  synonym  of  Health. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

MAN  RECEIVED  THE  BREATH  OF  LIFE 
AND  THUS  BECAME  A  LIVING  SOUL 

The  sentence  is  paraphrased  from  the  bible;  but  what  did 
the  Hebrew  writer  mean?    What  meant  the  wise  Egyptians  in 
keeping  among  their  most  treasured  scriptures  a  "Book  of  the 
Breaths  of  Life?"   What  meant  the  Aryans  by  "Pranayama— 
the  spiritual  science  of  breath?" 

The  author  recalls  the  advice  of  an  old  physician.  He 
knew  drugs,  but  was  not  bound  by  them.  He  knew  well  the 
ways  in  which  Nature  acts  under  given  circumstances.  He  was 
conferring  with  a  young  graduate  physician  in  regard  to  pul- 
monary tuberculosis.  "If  your  patient  breathes  less  air  than 
a  pint  and  a  half  at  a  breath,  get  rid  of  him  as  a  patient, — 
send  him  to  Arizona, — anywhere, — he  will  die  on  your  hands 
otherwise." 

To  breathe  amply  for  all  the  needs  of  the  body  is  a  lost 
art  with  the  majority  of  adults.  We  all  know,  of  course,  that 
oxygen  in  the  air  refreshes  the  blood  stream  in  the  body,  and 
is  necessary  for  the  combustion  and  elimination  of  effete  or 
"used  out"  components  of  the  cell  tissues.  Few  realize  the 
importance  of  this  process,  and  the  wisest  have  probably  not 
as  yet  guessed  all  that  is  tied  up  in  the  mysterious  activity  of 
mere  breathing.  It  is  significant  that  a  body  may  live  without 
food  a  month  and  frequently  even  longer;  it  may  be  deprived 
of  sleep  indefinitely  and  still  maintain  fairly  well;  it  may  go 
without  moisture  several  days  without  suffering,  but  it  will  die 
within  a  few  moments  if  deprived  of  air.  The  breath,  like  the 
taking  of  water,  serves  surely  both  to  rejuvenate  the  vitality 
of  the  body,  and  to  purify.  Only  its  action  is  more  vital  and 
more  keen  than  that  of  any  other  one  thing  we  may  use  to 
maintain  the  physical  mechanism. 

The  Aryan  sages  claimed  to  become  aware  of  an  element 
or  principle  "within"  the  air  which  they  called  "Prana."  We 
hesitate  to  interpret  this  term, — it  might  probably  be  called 
"the  source  of  life."  Its  more  specific  meaning  seems  to  be 
somewhat  like  "pure,  nascent  energy,  capable  of  becoming  or 
doing  anything  if  propelled  by  Will — human  or  divine." 

Some  of  the  better  exercises  for  forming  the  habit  of 
breathing  more  amply  are  as  follows: 


24  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

• 

I.  Lie  flat  on  the  back,   on  the   floor  or  on   a   lawn. 
Spread  the  arms   as   far  as  they  will   reach   to   either   side. 
Breathe,  and  encourage  the  muscles  and  vertebrae  immediately 
behind  the  lungs  to  arch,  as  they  will  have  a  tendency  to  do 
during  the  exercise.     Relax,  and  repeat  slowly  and  with  rest 
periods,  ten  to  twenty  times. 

II.  When  walking,   select  some  square  or  block  occa- 
sionally where  there  is  not  much  traffic.     Inhale,  while  walk- 
ing,  .as  usual, — but   instead  of   exhaling  take   an   additional 
breath  over  and  above  the  one  already  held.     Walk  twelve  or 
fifteen  steps  with  this  double  expansion  and  exhale.     To  avoid 
constriction  or  a  tendency  to  cough,  make  the  exhalation  in 
two  efforts;  that  is,  when  the  breath  is  half  exhaled,  take  a 
"catch"  breath,  and  then  release  the  rest  of  the  air  held  in  the 
lungs. 

III.  Do  not  forget  that  the  lungs  have  great  areas  of 
cells  which  are  for  the  most  part  practically  dormant.     Such 
dormant  "pockets"  often  contain  fouled  "residual"  air, — air 
that  may  have  been  inhaled  days  ago.     Eliminate  this  two  or 
three  times  every  day.     It  can  be  done  by  reversing  exercise 
No.  2.     That  is,  exhale  as  usual,  but  instead  of  inhaling  at 
once  according  to  natural  tendency,  just  exhale  vigorously  once 
more  with  a  prolonged  wheeze  if  necessary,  and  then  when 
you  know  that  every  atom  of  air  has  been  expelled,  inhale 
once  to  your  normal  capacity,  slowly. 

LET  Us  WATCH  ONE  BREATH 

There  is  a  deep  psychological  connection  between  breath- 
ing and  the  character  and  purposefulness  of  mental  action, 
and  the  resultant  emotions  and  thoughts.  We  shall  some  day 
find  the  scriptural  quotations  and  the  Oriental  sage's  views  in 
regard  to  breath  of  vast  and  vital  significance.  We  may  well 
imagine  that  the  blood-cells  physically  renewed  and  given  a 
new  lease  of  life  with  every  breath  do  not  travel  away  from 
the  lungs  empty-handed  psychically.  We  may  well  imagine 
them  imbued  with  the  thought  held  at  the  time  of  the  (to  it) 
rejuvenating  process.  The  cell  comes  to  the  lungs  half  dead, 
laden  with  a  burden  of  poison  and  debris;  fatigued  to  the  limit 
of  its  endurance.  Of  a  sudden  its  burden  melts;  it  is  vital, 
strong,  elastic  and  buoyant  once  more.  To  you  or  to  me  it  was 
nothing, — merely  taking  a  new  breath, — nothing.  But  to  the 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  25 

cell,  it  was  the  ONE  thing  needed;  without  it  there  would  be 
no  more  life  as  a  cell  entity.  Have  you  ever  remembered, 
when  awakening  from  a  profound  sleep,  from  a  faint,  from 
an  anaesthetic,  how  the  thing  that  first  attracted  your  atten- 
tion, in  some  unaccountable  way,  was  magnified  in  your  imagi- 
nation, in  fact,  in  some  way  actually  influenced  the  currents  of 
your  life?  The  thing  that  first  attracts  the  cell's  attention  in 
each  of  these  re-awakenings  from  near  death  is  your  thought 
of  the  moment,  as  well  as  your  basic  attitude  toward  life.  And 
it  proceeds  to  build  your  embodiment  accordingly.  It  rushes 
away  from  the  lungs  and  heart,  imbued  with  what  was  you  at 
the  time  it  re-awakened  there.  Then  as  it  travels  to  fulfill  its 
mission  throughout  the  veins  and  arteries  of  the  body,  other 
cells,  more  stationary,  by  the  contagion  of  its  influence,  take  up 
the  thought,  and  build  and  function  accordingly,  weighed  down 
only  by  the  essence  of  the  thoughts  you  have  thought  'during 
your  life.  The  new  thought  is  continually  acting  on  the  layer  of 
old  ones.  It  is  either  "fluffing"  them  out,  or  it  is  compressing 
them  with  more  weight,  into  prejudices  and  convictions.  Our 
prejudices  and  convictions  make  up  the  several  dispositions 
which  each  one  of  us  carries.  These  dispositions  mold  and 
shape  the  character,  which  generally,  but  not  always,  is  more 
of  a  unity.  The  character  determines  the  kind  of  embodiment, 
for  out  of  the  "breath"  (refer  again  to  uprana")  we  are  se- 
lecting ingredients  of  life  and  embodiment  only  according  to 
our  characters;  and  the  character  in  turn  shows  forth  in  the 
manner  of  the  embodiment;  character  influences,  as  well  as  de- 
termines, the  kind  of  environment  we  will  gravitate  toward 
willy  nilly,  and  the  manner  of  friends  and  associates, — even 
the  kind  of  enemies  we  will  attract.  This  is  in  part  what  is 
meant  by  the  "chemistry"  of  the  body  and  the  "chemistry"  of 
personality,  when  those  terms  are  found  in  the  literature  of 
modern  thought.  This  shows  in  some  slight  way  how  our 
destinies,  our  fortunes  and  our  adversities  are  self-made.  It 
shows  how  to  bolster  our  faith  with  an  insight  into  natural 
operations,  and  thereby  make  it  more  vital. 

OVEREATING  MEANS  UNDERNOURISHMENT 

Obesity  itself  means  usually  that  by  overeating  the  person 
has  starved  his  assimilating  mechanism  out  of  all  ability  other 
than  the  weak  effort  needed  to  turn  certain  food  ingredients 


26  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

into  fat.  The  measures  suggested  in  reference  to  the  proper 
use  of  air  and  of  water,  if  carried  out,  will  make  the  appetite 
more  normal.  Our  tastes  cannot  be  "natural"  no  matter  how 
much  we  insist  that  they  are  if  the  system  is  clogged  with  filth, 
and  if  the  organs  of  the  body  must  crowd  into  distorted  posi- 
tions by  a  flattened  chest.  We  must  learn  to  stand,  sit  and 
walk  in  healthy  postures,  and  that  is  easiest  done  bj  breathing 
amply.  By  amply,  we  mean  the  full  capacity,  and  that  itself 
increased  judiciously  by  the  exercises  given.  An  "ample" 
breath  will  crowd  outward  the  small,  loose,  or  "floating"  ribs, 
which  may  be  felt  two  or  three  inches  above  the  bones  of  the 
hip.  If  your  appetite  has  not  been  normal,  you  will  notice  an 
imperative  change  creeping  into  its  demands  as  you  keep  up 
with  rational  breathing,  and  maintain  the  body  as  clean  as 
sufficient  quantities  of  good,  fresh  water  will  make  it. 

I'f  there  has  been  a  tendency  toward  high  blood  pressure, 
for  instance,  or  toward  hardening  of  the  arteries, — toward 
deposits  of  uric  and  other  acids,  cropping  out  in  twinges  of 
neuritis  and  of  rheumatism, — then  if  you  have  given  your  body 
the  drill  already  described,  you  will  notice  a  tendency  in  your 
appetite  not  to  call  for  the  products  of  the  farmer's  barnyard 
and  slaughter-house.  Fish,  eggs,  milk,  cheese,  and  meat  are 
richly  nitrogenous  foods,  excellent  for  the  growing  body  of  the 
child  and  adolescent,  but  furnishing  an  over-plus  of  unusable 
building  material  if  taken  into  the  body  of  the  average  adult. 
If  the  condition  has  been  diabetic,  the  appetite  you  will  note,  of 
itself,  will  begin  to  call  less  and  less  for  sugar  and  for  starchy 
foods,  which  readily  change  into  sugar  when  once  introduced 
into  the  system.  And  so  on. 

The  same  "inner"  consciousness  that  digests,  and  knows 
how  to  digest  perfectly,  also  knows  how  to  select  perfectly.  If 
it  is  given  a  chance  to  function  unhampered  by  a  clogged 
physique,  unhampered  by  an  emotion-ridden  mind,  the  diet 
itself  will  not  matter  much.  You  will  automatically  find  your- 
self eating  the  things  that  you  need,  instead  of  the  things  that 
you  want.  If  by  chance  occasionally  you  do  eat  things  that  you 
merely  want,  even  then,  if  unhampered,  that  alimentary  intel- 
ligence will  take  what  it  needs  out  of  the  dish  you  wanted  and 
discard  the  rest  in  Nature's  way  after  you  have  eaten  it.  It  is 
not  so  much  a  question  of  "What  shall  I  eat,"  as  it  is  a  ques- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  27 

tion  of  "What  are  you  thinking  of,  and  Who  are  you  that  are 
going  to  eat."  If  you  eat  in  a  worried  condition,  you  are 
actually  building  into  yourself  greater  capacity  for  more  worry. 
It  is  a  thankless  undertaking.  If  you  are  flatulently  optimistic 
at  such  times,  you  are  then  and  there  increasing  your  inability 
to  help  in  the  ubig  scheme,"-— for  if  you  should  even  a  thou- 
sand years  later  see  a  man  with  his  leg  suddenly  broken  or  cut 
off  in  some  traffic  accident,  you  will  be  able  to  tell  him  to  be 
cheerful,  and  that  is  all.  The  mind  at  all  times  should  be  bent 
not  only  on  willingness,  but  upon  the  acquisition  of  knowledge 
and  ABILITY  to  serve.  Optimism  and  cheerfulness  are  the 
most  valuable  sidelines  in  the  world,  but  that  person  is  doing 
himself  an  injustice  who  prides  himself  on  them  as  his  chief 
stock  in  trade  to  the  exclusion  of  Integrity,  Knowledge,  Will- 
ingness, and  Ability. 

MOVEMENT 

A  stationary  body  may  do  all  the  things  so  far  discussed, 
and  yet  receive  not  one  whit  of  benefit  in  the  way  of  health. 
\\e  exist  in  a  plane  where  physical  movement  is  practically 
synonymous  with  life  itself.  If  the  body  is  gently  moved, 
exercised  both  in  limbs  and  organs  during  a  deep  breath,  for 
instance,  then  all  the  organs,  instead  of  only  the  lungs,  have  a 
chance  to  participate  in  the  benefit.  Again,  during  any  form  of 
exercise,  the  benefits  are  doubled,  if  the  mind  is  made  to  co- 
operate with  the  action.  Thinking  intently  of  a  promissory 
note  due  tomorrow,  while  flailing  the  air  wildly  with  the  arms, 
is  not  exercise  even  if  you  call  it  that;  it  will  not  develop  the 
biceps;  it  will  only  increase  your  capacity  for  worry.  It  is 
doubtful  whether  it  will  in  the  least  help  to  pay  the  note.  The 
blood  circulates  easily  according  to  the  currents  of  one's  atten- 
tion. The  visit  of  blood  to  any  part  of  the  body  means  either 
one  or  the  other  of  these  two  things,  and  sometimes  both  : 
The  (1)  nutrition  or  (2)  stimulation,  in  short,  the  BUILDING 
of  tissue,  form  or  function  visited.  If  you  want  a  well-rounded 
neck,  exercise  in  a  fashion  to  bring  the  blood  there  naturally, 
helping  with  gentle  massage  anon,  and  always  Imagining  the 
result  you  want.  If  it  is  more  weight  that  is  wanted,  use  the 
imagination — impress  it  with  a  picture  of  your  body  as  you 
should  like  it  to  be. 


28  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

Do  not  depart  too  widely  from  YOUR  TYPE  in  the 
picture  you  thus  hold,  or  you  will  be  wasting  energy  and  time. 
Nature  seems  to  decree  that  we  must  work  toward  a  perfection 
each  person  of  his  or  her  particular  type,  and  if  we  do  this 
with  every  tool  we  have,  above  all,  with  fundamental  expecta- 
tion, we  are  richly  rewarded.  Do  this  with  especial  vigor  dur- 
ing exercises,  and  expect  results;  no  matter  how  much  or  how 
little  you  desire,  want  or  wish  for  results,  EXPECT  them. 
Sleep  more  than  heretofore,  if  possible,  should  added  weight 
be  the  necessity;  sleep  a  little  less,  if  reduction  of  weight  is 
desired.  Also  if  the  latter  be  the  case,  resolutely  eliminate  from 
the  diet  such  nitrogenous  foods  as  were  formerly  enumerated. 

Whatever  the  departure  from  normal  physical  perfection 
may  be,  exercise  is  the  great  equalizer, — the  "normalizer." 
You  may  be  nervous,  catarrhal,  rheumatic,  too  fat,  too  lean, 
or  tubercular.  The  essentials  so  far  recommended,  if  carried 
out  with. plenty  of  exercise  to  effectualize  the  application  of 
the  former  factors,  will  do  for  you  what  a  regiment  of  physi- 
cians and  trained  nurses  can  never  do. 

And  after  all  they  are  simple  to  remember  and  to  apply; 
the  first  two  are  the  greatest  cleansers  and  vitalizers  in  the 
world — not  merely  AIR  and  WATER, — but  the  right  and  ample 
use  of  AIR  and  WATER. 

The  Items  necessary  for  building,  rebuilding,  effectualiz- 
ing  and  maintaining  are  the  proper  use  of  food  and  physical 
exercise.  These  four  features  may  be  imagined  as  four  pow- 
erful horses,  galloping  in  the  most  sure-footed  manner  wher- 
ever your  fundamental  attitude  toward  life,  the  quality  and 
character  of  your  mental  activity  is  directing  them.  Or  again 
they  may  be  pictured  as  four  expert  mechanics,  building  your 
earthly  tabernacle  according  to  the  way  you  allow  either  your 
irresponsible  emotions,  or  your  rational,  purposeful  WILL,  to 
boss  them. 


LESSON  II. 
MENTAL  INFLUENCE 

"You  never  can  tell  what  a  thought  will  do, 
In  bringing  you  hate  or  love ; 
For  thoughts  are  things,  and  their  airy  wings 
Are  swifter  than  carrier  doves. 
They  follow  the  law  of  the  universe; 
Each  thing  creates  its  kind. 
They  speed  o'er  the  track  to  bring  you  back 
Whatever  went  out  from  your  mind." — (E.  W.  Wilcox) 

IN  THE  foregoing  lesson  we  observed  the  four  main 
physical  essentials  of  health,  namely,  the  proper  use  of 
Water,  Air,  Food  and  Exercise.  Now,  if  we  were  to  pick 
ten  passersby  from  the  main  street  of  your  town  or  city,  and 
could  induce  these  ten  persons  faithfully  to  adopt  a  correct 
regimen  in  regard  to  all  those  essentials,  we  would  probably 
note  at  the  end  of  a  year  that,  altho  each  of  the  ten  benefited, 
yet  the  benefits  would  be  of  different  kinds.  How  would  we 
account  for  these  differences?  By  THE  BASIC  MENTAL  ATTI- 
TUDE of  the  person  himself. 

All  those  four  activating  factors  act  according  to  the 
kind  of  mental  influence  radiated  upon  them  by  the  person.  It 
is  well  known  to  specialists  that  food  stock  should  never  be 
slaughtered  when  in  a  state  of  fatigue,  anxiety  or  fear, — as 
the  meat  then  will  not  prove  edible.  Chemical  actions  2nd 
reactions  are  at  all  times  taking  place  within  the  body.  There 
may  be  many  causes,  obscure  as  well  as  obvious,  for  those 
changes,  but  one  of  the  most  obvious  causes  lies  in  the  state  of 
the  emotions. 

In  some  laboratories  one  may  perchance  find  a  delicate 
balancing  table.  A  person  may  so  adjust  himself  upon  it  that 
the  scales  at  both  ends  show  equal  weight.  An  interesting 
proof  of  the  physiological  effect  of  thought  and  emotion  may 
then  be  witnessed.  If  the  person  so  laid  out  on  the  table  can 
stimulate  his  imagination  that  he  is  running, — running  as  from 
some  impending  danger, — very  soon  the  foot  end  of  the  table 
will  show  overweight  and  the  head  end  underweight.  The 

29 


30  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

blood,  and  naturally  the  energies  of  the  body,  have  followed 
the  emotions  and  the  thought  to  the  feet.  Let  the  same  person 
now  imagine  that  he  is  being  crushed  beneath  a  falling  log, 
and  that  alternate  lifting  with  each  shoulder  is  all  that  will 
free  and  save  his  life.  Let  him  continue  this  purely  imaginar\ 
exercise  vigorously  only  a  few  moments,  and  presently  the 
markings  of  the  scales  will  have  reversed  themselves — the  foot 
end  underweight  and  the  head  end  overweight. 

Fear,  anxiety,  envy,  jealousy,  all  these  destructive  emo- 
tions, are  allowed  to  play  through  us  only  because  of  ignor- 
ance as  to  what  their  consequences  are.  Acute,  excited  fear  or 
anxiety  will  open  the  adrenalin  glands,  releasing  copious  quan- 
tities of  that  fluid  into  the  blood  stream  of  the  body.  Nature, 
evidently  on  the  theory  that  if  you  fear  or  are  anxious,  neces- 
sarily you  must  be  wanting  to  fight  physically,  or  to  run  fast 
and  far,  then  supplies  you  with  this  powerful  stimulant.  Un- 
less dissipated  in  vigorous  and  prolonged  physical  exercise,  it 
does  not  prove  to  be  a  stimulant  at  all,  but  seems  to  act  more 
like  an  insidious  and  persistent  poison.  It  is  the  conjecture  of 
psychology  that  many  ailments  such  as  paralysis,  diabetes, 
Bright's  Disease,  etc.,  are  the  results  of  ignorant  indulgence  in 
violent  and  destructive  emotions, — that  they  are  to  be  classed 
among  the  worry  and  anxiety  diseases,  as  typhoid  and  similar 
ailments  have  long  been  classed  among  the  filth  diseases. 
Self-neglect  causes  the  filth  diseases. 

Self-abuse  causes  the  anxiety  diseases.  The  worst  form 
of  self-abuse  is  destructive  emotionalism.  It  is  just  as  easy  to 
saturate  oneself  with  enthusiasm,  self-confidence,  and  optimism 
by  the  mere  insistence  to  oneself  that  the  opposite  mental  atti- 
tudes are  irrational.  There  are  many  people  who  must  be  in  a 
frantic  state  of  activity  and  distraction;  quiet  or  solitude  with 
such  immediately  brings  on  a  mood  of  depression.  If  the 
mind  is  trained  to  stand  always  in  a  constructive  attitude, 
however,  there  is  nothing  more  valuable  than  a  frequent  with- 
drawal from  all  activity,  and  the  person  will  learn  to  value 
such  periods  .every  bit  as  much  as  the  active  "good  time." 
Spontaneously,  pictures  will  spring  up  in  the  mind  at  such 
times — representations  of  ideals  to  be  attained  with  means 
suggested  how  to  attain  them.  Feel  yourself  being  submerged 
in  and  surcharged  with  a  fullness  of  energy  that  sends  you 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  31 

back  into  the  world  of  activity  buoyant,  genial,  successful.  Too 
many  people  are  satisfied  barely  to  drag  along  through  life, — 
but  gladly  would  grasp  at  vitality  and  health  and  success  if  it 
were  handed  them  on  a  silver  platter.  Psychology  merely  ex- 
plains that  .each  one  of  us  may  grab  the  means  of  health  and 
success.  If  we  have  ailments  then  we  have  made  them.  If  we 
have  made  them,  then  we  can  unmake  them.  And  as  we  proceed 
to  unmake  our  ailments  and  inefficiencies,  if  only  by  the  methods 
already  suggested,  we  will  find  our  personalities  growing  so 
magnetic  that  it  will  be  a  stimulation  for  others  merely  to  meet 
us.  This  last  should  be  qualified  before  going  further,  with 
this  question:  If  you  are  not  in  possession  of  many  friends, 
just  how  glad  are  you  to  meet  and  commune  with  those  you  do 
possess?  There  is  a  deep  law  of  cause  and  effect  running 
underneath  and  within  all  features  of  life.  It  is  a  curious 
fact  that  many  people,  apparently  quite  successful,  are  often 
found  without  true  friends  merely  because  the  law,  "If  you, 
want  friends,  be  one,"  is  not  understood. 

Picture  yourself  to  yourself — be  proud  of  the  fact  that 
you   can  lend  yourself  your  own   encouragement, — and  then 
substantiate  your  pride  by  actually  doing  the  things  that  appeal 
to  you  as  meant  for  your  progress  toward  your  ideal.     There 
will  be  much  improvement  in  the  mental  influence  you  give 
yourself  and  radiate  to  others  if  only  this  one  instruction  is 
whole-heartedly  carried  out  for  a  month.    You  will  find  your- 
self rising  in  your  own  estimation, — really  on  the  par  instead 
of  whiningly  apologizing  for  this  defeat  and  the  other.     You 
will  observe  facts,  and  take  them  for  what  they  are.     If  you 
are  in  the  wrong  situation,  you  will  not  any  more  allow  it  to 
magnify  itself  in  your  mind  as  some  monster  that  enslaves  you 
from  eternity  and  unto  eternity.     You  will  take  it  merely  as 
the  present  temporary  fact,  of  no  more  significance  than  a 
thousand  other  facts  which  surround  you.     You  will  see  that 
just  as  great  a  fact  as  the  unwelcome  or  unworthy  situation  is 
the    overwhelming     fact    that    YOU    WILL    GET    OUT,     and 
that   the   GETTING   OUT   will   be    an    improvement   over   the 
old  environment.     The  secret  of  developing,  improving  and 
strengthening  mental  influence  is  just  this  ability  to  recognize 
fact,  without  minimizing  the  importance  of  it,  nor  yet  piling 


32  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

on  it  extravagant  theories,   or  meanings,   and  then   allowing 
such  theories  and  meanings  to  enslave  us. 

The  successful  man  or  woman  is  never  known  to  build 
cramping  nightmares  even  out  of  the  most  distressing  facts. 
If  heredity  were  the  formidable  thing  claimed  for  it  some 
decades  ago,  some  of  the  greatest  personages  in  history  would 
never  have  been  great.  Many  of  them  sprang  from  hereditary 
strains  that  were  poor  and  obscure,  without  faculty  or  talent. 
They  were  strong  enough  to  take  the  fact  of  a  poor  heredity 
at  its  face  value,  and  overtop  it  with  the  greater  fact  of  their 
determination  to  be  what  they  wished  to  be. 

Don't  be  afraid  of  facts.  Don't  deny  facts.  For  the 
most  part,  physical  conditions,  whether  they  pertain  to  health 
or  to  other  circumstance,  are  the  result  or  effects  of  mental 
causes.  Realize  that  to  the  extent  which  you  control  your  own 
mind  and  emotions,  to  the  extent  you  transform  irresponsible 
destructive  emotions  into  constructive  attitudes, — to  that  ex- 
tent will  your  dreams  and  your  wishes  come  true  according  to 
the  silent  operations  of  your  WILL. 

People  who  indulge  in  destructive  emotions  ALWAYS 
have  real  reasons  for  doing  so.  The  truly  advancing  student 
of  psychology  must  learn  to  REFUSE  anxiety,  worry,  jeal- 
ousy, pettiness  and  selfishness, — must  learn  to  refuse  them 
entrance  at  the  threshold  of  his  mind,  no  matter  how  valid 
may  sound  their  reasons  for  wanting  entrance.  Insist  that 
only  such  material  may  enter  your  mind  as  will  help,  and  not 
oppose  the  wonderful  way  of  body-building  which  Nature  has 
ordained.  Insist  that  you  will  see  more  and  more  clearly, 
and  comply  more  and  more  easily  with  the  constructive  phase 
of  that  law.  It  will  become  apparent  that  each  person  builds 
his  destiny  not  only  year  to  year,  but  minute  to  minute.  You, 
as  you  find  yourself  today,  ARE  your  destiny  THUS  FAR.  You 
are  what  you  are  and  where  you  are  today,  as  the  result  of 
mental  attitudes  you  have  indulged  and  thoughts  you  have 
given  birth  to  in  the  past.  No  phrase  sums  it  up  better  than 
this:  The  thoughts  of  today  become  the  dreams  of  tonight, 
the  actions  of  tomorrow,  and  the  character  of  the  future. 
Thoughts  long  held  become  convictions;  they  reach  their  nth 
power — like  weak  fluids  that  we  watch  fermenting  for  a  while 
and  then  turning  into  alcohol.  Such  "essences"  of  thought, 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  33 

deep  convictions,  often  cannot  be  changed  quickly  by  taking  up 
a  new  channel  of  "surface  thinking."  The  REALIZATION 
that  you  are  an  all-powerful  soul  with  absolute  dominion  over 
the  weal  or  woe  of  your  own  body  can  be  brought  about 
through  persistence.  Deepen  and  yet  more  deepen  the  funda- 
mental changes  in  your  convictions,  and  look  less  for  quick  re- 
sults in  these  things.  The  results  will  come  quickly  enough 
and  in  abundant  measure  as  soon  as  your  mental  currents  be- 
come obedient  to  your  will. 

Note  the  things  that  YOU  are  today,  the  things  that 
HAPPENED  TO  YOU  today.  They  are,  and  they  befell  you 
in  exact  obedience  to  the  same  law.  They  happened  as  a 
result  of  your  subconscious  WILL.  The  subconscious  will,  if 
we  have  not  forgotten,  acts  only  with  as  much  freedom,  only 
with  as  much  choice,  as  the  weight  of  your  biases,  prejudices, 
destructive  emotions,  and  the  essences  of  your  past  thinking 
will  allow.  The  sooner  you  can  completely  rid  it  of  all  en- 
cumbrances, the  sooner  will  it  operate  just  as  magically,  just 
as  effectively,  to  make  you  and  your  environment  over  into 
what  you  dream  of,  imagine,  yearn  after  and  idealize.  Your 
body  is  a  solidified  substance,  builded  subtly  and  wonderfully 
by  the  action  of  mind.  The  action  of  mind  made  a  "matrix," 
as  the  printers  call  it,  into  which  as  it  were  this  body  has  been 
poured,  and  by  which  it  has  been  moulded.  No  illness,  no 
defect  in  physique,  can  appear,  except  by  some  defect  or 
impairment  in  our  thinking.  It  is  the  influence  of  our  own 
thinking  which  either  topples  us  from  the  road  of  health,  or 
with  gyroscopic  stability,  keeps  us  in  the  sunny  middle  road  of 
health  and  poise. 

It  is  not  what  happens  to  us  that  matters.  To  the  bright- 
est luminaries  in  history  more  dreadful  things  happened  than 
will  ever,  it  is  hoped,  happen  to  you-  It  did  not  matter;  they 
did  not  allow  it  to  matter.  The  great  thing  that  does  matter 
is,  how  will  you  react  to  this  or  that  occurrence  in  your  life? 
In  other  words,  How  will  you  take  it?  How  you  take  a  thing 
determines  what  you  are  engrafting  into  your  own  character — 
determines  in  fact  then  and  there  some  corresponding  modifi- 
cation in  the  strength  and  quality  of  your  mental  influence. 
And  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  great  shocks  in  life  seldom 
are  reacted  to  badly.  We  seem  to  be  elevated  and  dignified, 


34  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

as  by  the  touch  of  some  superior  being  then,  and  the  reaction 
to  the  sudden  and  real  soul  cataclysm  is  seldom  destructive. 
Where  attention  is  needed,  however,  is  on  the  common  detailed 
occurrences  of  everyday  life.  It  is  the  reaction  we  give,  it  is 
how  we  take  what  this  person  did,  and  what  the  other  person 
said,  that  needs  readjustment  in  line  with  correct  psychology. 

Any  person,  unless  he  be  a  yellow  cur,  will  die  that  others 
might  live;  but  we  often  find  the  same  person  an  unbearable 
cad  or  shrew  in  everyday  life.  It  is  so  easy  to  die,  especially 
if  our  pictures  will  be  put  in  the  papers  after  the  event.  But 
it  is  such  a  bother  to  live,  grow,  and  help  others  in  living  and 
growing.  The  psychological  student  reverses  the  channels  of 
this  sort  of  "heroism"  and  renews  his  efforts  every  minute  of 
the  waking  day,  if  necessary,  to  keep  the  energy  wasted  in  day- 
dreams of  martyrdom  down  to  the  business  of  living 
efficiently.  People  do  not  need  others  to  die  for  them  so  much 
as  they  need  more  units  in  society  who  will  make  effort  to  live 
for  each  other's  benefit.  If  every  key  on  the  piano  determined 
grimly  to  "live  its  own  life"  (that  is,  its  own  exclusive  or  selfish 
life)  we'd  have  mighty  poor  harmony  from  that  instrument. 
Moreover,  an  expert  musician  would  declare  each  individual 
key  as  "no  good." 

The  first  thing,  then,  in  order  to  develop  the  habit  of  right 
arid  constructive  mental  influence,  Nis  to  favor  curiosity  and 
knowledge  of  natural  laws  more,  and  to  favor  our  accumula- 
tions of  convictions  less.  Our  "likes"  and  "dislikes,"  often  have 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  natural  law;  our  likes  and  dislikes 
often  oppose  the  laws  of  nature.  Natural  laws  are  psycho- 
logical first,  foremost  and  all  the  time.  By  studying  our  own 
mental  actions  we  find  how  character  and  personality  are  con- 
structed. If  we  do  not  like  the  manner  of  construction  so  far, 
we  must  learn  to  operate  mental  laws  according  to  the  design 
we  do  want. 

How?  Our  character  selects  for  us  ingredients  out  of 
food,  air  and  water  in  order  to  build  according  to  its  own 
nature.  A  bird  eating  the  same  wheat  you  eat  for  breakfast 
makes  of  that  wheat  feathers,  claws,  and  vitalizes  its  ability  to 
sing.  Its  bird  character  does  the  selecting  quite  automatically. 
Your  character  is  not  the  bird's.  You  could  not  make  feathers 
of  that  wheat  if  you  wanted  to.  Your  subconscious  processes 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  35 

make  of  it  tissue,  bone,  muscle,  hair,  nails,  fluids,  etc.  But 
here  are  Mrs.  Jones,  red-headed  and  squat;  Mr.  Brown,  bald- 
headed  and  dignified  and  tall,  and  Miss  Graham — neurotic, 
esthetic  and  anaemic,  all  eating  wheat  porridge  at  the  break- 
fast table.  Mrs.  Jones,  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  by  thought 
she  can  gradually  and  effectively  change  her  character,  allows 
her  present  character  and  disposition  to  do  her  selecting,  and, 
of  course,  the  subconscious  processes  all  work  dutifully  to 
keep  her  squat,  and  mentally  dense — all  from  the  same  wheat 
porridge,  out  of  the  same  beverages  and  water  that  may  be 
drunk,  out  of  the  same  air  breathed  by  Mr.  Brown  and  Miss 
Graham.  Mr.  Brown,  by  the  same  token,  has  a  subconscious 
mind  that  keeps  him  dignified,  probably  priggish  enough  to 
lose  out  on  many  prospective  friendships  which  would  be 
valuable  to  him.  Miss  Graham,  daintily  imbibing  the  same 
porridge,  does  not  see,  of  course,  that  the  subconscious  mind 
is  twisting  and  perverting  her  quite  natural  desires  and  urges 
into  thinned-out,  pseudo-enthusiasms  for  "art,"  or  "bohemian- 
ism,"  or  parlor  bolshevism,  and  thereby  building  into  her,  ac- 
cording to  her  character,  the  mental  influence  of  still  more  self- 
fear,  which  is  neurosis.  A  cobra  eating  of  the  same  porridge, 
would  turn  it  into  a  poison  so  violent  as  to  turn  any  chemist 
green  with  envy, — according  to  its  cobra  character,  and  then 
the  lawn-rabbit  would  turn  the  same  wheat,  according  to  its 
character  into  timidity  and  fat. 

The  subconscious  mind  builds  according  to  the  ideas, 
emotions  and  pictures  which  mentally  you  are  holding  before 
it.  That  is  the  mental  influence  you  are  continually  playing 
upon  yourself;  that  is  the  mesmeric  or  hypnotic  influence  by 
yourself  upon  yourself  which  never  ceases  and  never  will  cease. 
It  will,  however,  improve  or  deteriorate  according  to  your 
character.  You  can  change  your  character  by  realizing  that 
you  built  it  by  conscious  thinking  in  the  first  place,  and  that  its 
reconstruction  will  be  accomplished  in  the  same  way.  In  fact, 
even  if  one  ignores  the  issue,  it  is  being  added  to,  or  some- 
thing is  being  taken  away  from  it,  at  all  times,  without  a  mo- 
ment's cessation.  And  the  "selecting"  which  is  discussed  in  the 
foregoing  takes  place  not  only  with  the  food  eaten,  but  just 
as  effectively  out  of  the  air  breathed,  the  water  consumed, 
from  the  stimulation  of  exercise,  and  from  the  collective 


36  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

"auras"  of  people  contacted  in  everyday  life.  The  nature  of 
mind  is  that  it  is  not  quiet  for  a  moment.  Just  because  some 
phases  of  mind  are  not  in  your  field  of  awareness  does  not 
make  such  subconscious  phases  less  active  than  that  part  which 
you  can  watch.  The  subconscious  phase  is  much  greater,  much 
more  active  than  that  phase  of  mind  with  which  you  commonly 
identify  yourself. 

But  great  as  is  the  subconscious  mind,  it  works  in  line 
with  such  mental  influence  as  you  are  able  to  radiate  from 
your  aware  and  conscious  feelings,  emotions,  thoughts  and 
aspirations.  Bear  all  this  in  mind  when  walking,  when  danc- 
ing, when  swimming,  when  eating,  drinking  or  resting.  Insist 
on  the  freed  activity  of  your  own  self;  determine  to  master 
states  of  consciousness,  especially  in  the  emotional  field,  in- 
stead of  allowing  them  to  enslave  you. 

Determine  to  be  glad  you  are  in  this  world;  work  for, 
demand  and  EXPECT  success.  Picture  that  success  as  the 
kind  that  benefits  your  entire  circle  of  friends  and  acquaint- 
ances. Picture  at  the  same  time  that  circle  as  ever  widening 
and  growing;  for  much  of  life  is  lived  thru  our  contacts, 
friendships  and  acquaintanceships.  Demand  that  you  get  more 
than  diversion  and  amusement  from  reading  and  from  the 
theatre.  Expect  to  see  in  and  thru  things,  to  derive  their  inner 
meaning,  their  distillation,  their  essence,  their  soul.  Such  liv- 
ing will  enrich  the  personality,  and  make  you  a  radiating,  mag- 
netic, beneficial  unit  in  society.  You  will  then  be  a  real  success. 
And  yet,  do  not  forget  that  the  greatest  successes  often  con- 
sider themselves  failures.  Richelieu  regarded  himself  as  a 
failure, — great  statesman  that  he  was,  he  wanted  to  be  a  poet. 
He  probably  would  have  been  a  very  bad  one.  Beethoven 
considered  himself  as  a  tyro  and  bungling  amateur  in  music,— 
yet  unmistakably  he  was  the  greatest  master  of  music  that  has 
trod  this  earth.  This  world  is,  as  it  were,  a  participial  class 
in  school.  Everything  ends  with  "ing."  Nothing  in  the  past 
perfect  tense  ending  with  "edn  is  to  be  found.  To  realize  this 
will  add  to  the  effect  of  our  efforts  by  lending  us  a  legitimate 
contentment.  Yet,  let  us  realize  that  pursuit  of  knowledge,  of 
happiness,  of  efficiency  and  success  are  methods  of  carrying  out 
the  divine  command,  "Be  Ye  Perfect,"  and  that  the  best  way 
of  obeying  that  command  is  to  start  with  self-study. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  37 

"In  THE  BEGINNING"  MEANS  NOW. 

No  system  of  philosophy,  no  scheme  of  life,  is  complete 
without  first  postulating  the  eternal,  causeless  being  of  an  all- 
pervasive  intelligence  and  power.  In  religion  this  power  is 
called  God.  Some  call  that  originating  point  of  all  life  and 
being  by  the  name  of  Spirit.  Some  call  it  the  Oversoul.  Some 
scientific  philosophers  call  it  the  Ether,  but  they  know  little 
about  it.  Some  apply  to  It  such  descriptives  as  Light,  Life, 
Love,  Omnipotence,  Omniscience,  Compassion,  etc.  Undoubt- 
edly It  is  the  source  of  ALL.  But,  again,  not  to  trespass  or 
subvert  in  the  least  any  faith  or  conception  of  that  ONE,  let 
us  view  the  matter  just  to  see  if  psychology  can  add  anything 
to  our  clearness  of  comprehension. 

Psychology  says  merely  that  with  every  different  form  of 
organism  that  One  manifests  and  acts  only  according  to  what 
that  particular  organism  offers  as  a  "machine"  thru  which  to 
act.  Psychology  points  out  that  in  every  so-called  "act  of 
providence,"  machinery  seen  or  unseen  was  used.  If  we  have 
a  prophecy  from  some  one,  and  that  prophecy  comes  true,  we 
must  admit  that  the  mind  of  some  man  or  woman  was  the  in- 
strument thru  which  it  came.  If  for  the  major  part  of  my  life- 
time I  so  attuned  my  mind  only  to  the  deepest  verities  of 
nature,  and  to  altruistic  purposes,  I  have  no  doubt  but  that 
even  my  fancies  and  my  dreams  would  be  clairvoyant  of  actu- 
alities— past,  present  or  future.  If  I  had  my  mind  so  attuned 
that  it  was  hostile  to  every  morbid  whim,  impervious  to  de- 
pression,— I  know  that  the  ONE  can  work,  and  must  then 
work,  thru  me  to  radiate  health  and  beneficence  on  others,  and 
that  I  myself  would  not  be  excluded.  If,  however,  my  mind 
was  carelessly  governed;  if  I  allowed  facts  to  fly  out,  and  my 
own  prejudices  and  whims  and  selfish  emotions  to  rule,  then 
the  more  I  prayed  for  the  presence  and  the  inflow  of  that 
ONE,  the  more  ill  at  ease  I  would  become — because  that  most 
tremendous  energy  in  the  universe  could  do  no  more  than  to 
animate  the  machinery  I  held  up  to  it.  Study,  work,  willing- 
ness and  ability  to  serve, — these  are  psychologically,  we  see, 
the  only  valid  forms  of  worship.  The  "blessings"  from  that 
form  of  worship  are  immediately  apparent  in  improved  health 
and  efficiency,  physical,  moral,  mental,  psychic  and  spiritual. 

True  psychology  is  not  so  much  concerned  with  teaching 


38  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

students  mental  tricks.  It  is  concerned  utterly  and  absolutely 
with  making  the  mind  a  subservient  tool  and  instrument  for 
the  true  self.  If  "tricks"  are  needed  at  any  time  for  purposes 
of  demonstration,  if  the  mind  has  been  drilled  in  correct  atti- 
tudes, the  ability  will  be  there.  What  if  every  Bowery  thug 
could  do  what  Houdini  does?  What  if  one  of  such  thugs 
went  to  Houdini  for  "lessons?"  What  would  Houdini  say? 
I  do  not  know  how  much  of  a  sage  that  clever  prestidigitator 
may  be,  but  I  rather  think  he  would  send  back  the  denizen  of 
the  Bowery  to  some  school  or  other,  where  a  wholesome  re- 
spect for  the  decencies  and  amenities  of  human  life  would  first 
be  inculcated  into  him.  Houdini's  knowledge  and  ability 
spilled  into  the  machinery  which  the  thug  holds  up  would 
destroy  and  ruin  every  one  whom  the  thug  thereafter  con- 
tacted, and  would  figuratively  send  the  thug  himself  to  hell. 
For  the  thug,  no  matter  how  or  in  what  manner  Houdini 
would  teach  him,  subconsciously  would  be  "selecting"  accord- 
ing to  his  character.  And  he  would  thereafter  use  his  "selec- 
tion" according  to  that  same  character.  That  is  what  most  of 
us  do  after  reading  or  studying  the  New  Testament.  Then  we 
wonder  what  mysterious  fate  hounds  us  with  mental  ineffi- 
ciency, restlessness,  or  physical  impairment.  Nothing  hounds 
us,  nothing  hampers  us,  except  the  veils  of  misconception 
which  we  hug  the  tighter  around  us  in  the  face  of  FACTS  and 
NATURAL  LAWS.  When  we  can  look  our  own  prejudices 
in  the  face  and  expose  them  with  the  same  blithesomeness  that 
we  perform  that  service  for  unwilling  Mrs.  Jones  in  the  next 
house  or  Mr.  Brown  in  still  the  next,  a  great  deal  of  the 
mystery  will  dissipate  into  thin  air. 

If  you  have  apparently  been  inefficient  before  then,  you 
will  see  clearly  why.  You  will  be  able  to  deal  intelligently 
with  yourself.  You  will  be  able  to  place  yourself.  You  will 
no  longer  be  a  square  peg  in  a  round  hole.  You  will  be  able 
to  criticise  yourself  intelligently,  and  to  encourage  yourself 
intelligently.  You  will  avoid  the  sin  of  self-condemnation  and 
of  self-belittling  as  tho'  it  were  poison.  Next  to  self-praise 
and  self-inflation,  the  greatest  crime  is  self-condemnation.  All 
these  are  disguised,  and  therefore  the  most  dangerous  manifes- 
tations of  selfishness.  Selfishness  means  that  you  are  excluding 
knowledge  from  yourself  to  the  extent  that  you  are  excluding 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  39 

considerations  of  other  folks'  welfare.  Nature  or  the  ONE 
intends  that  each  human  being  REALIZE  that  he  is  united 
and  at  one  with  every  other.  While  we  refuse  to  recognize 
and  live  according  to  that  FACT  in  Nature,  the  ONE  will  see 
to  it  that  we  "die"  again  and  again,  in  order  that  with  the 
essential  accumulation  gathered,  we  may,  refreshed  by  the 
oblivion  of  detailed  memory,  try  again  and  yet  again. 

But,  in  the  meantime,  let  us  use  our  mental  influence, 
while  we  are  improving  it,  according  to  the  knowledg  of  psy- 
chology we  already  have.  There  is  not  one  but  may  improve 
his  value  to  himself  and  others  by  becoming  more  efficient  in 
the  business  of  living.  Too  many  in  contemplating  abstract 
verities,  are  like  the  girl  in  the  missionary  school.  She  was 
undergoing  training  to  become  what  is  known  as  a  medical 
missionary.  But  she  was  so  imbued  with  all  she  was  going  to 
do  for  the  poor  benighted  heathen  that  her  mind  utterly 
failed  to  register  any  of  the  technique  of  medicine  and  of  nurs- 
ing which  she  was  there  to  learn.  Of  course  she  was  expelled 
in  due  time,  still  ineffectually  blubbering  about  the  dire  fate  of 
the  poor  heathen  without  her  ministrations.  Lucky  heathen,— 
that  she  never  found  her  way  to  them! 

If  you  are  a  mother,  how  much  more  of  a  real  mother 
you  may  be  by  revealing  to  yourself  thru  psychology  some 
of  the  wonderful  laws  concerned  in  the  building  up  of 
the  budding  personalities  entrusted  to  your  custody.  You  are 
the  Priestess  of  the  ONE  in  a  far  more  real  sense  than  any 
mitered  dignitary  in  a  temple  or  cathedral.  You  can  make 
or  mar  the  blueprint  of  human  perfection,  which  in  its  soul, 
the  child  has  brought  down  to  earth  from  God.  Learn  more 
and  yet  more  how  to  make  conformation  to  that  ideal  design 
easy  and  habitual  as  the  personalities  whom  you  call  your 
children  begin  to  mature. 

If  you  are  a  father,  learn  the  psychological  weight  that 
exists,  admitted  or  unadmitted,  in  the  mere  fact  of  being  the 
"head  of  the  household."  You  will  learn  thru  psychology, 
that  no  matter  What  You  Are,  unconsciously  you  are  being 
"selected"  as  an  ideal  to  follow.  Your  influence,  the  actions 
which  you  conceal  from  the  child,  the  schemes  you  never  reveal 
to  the  child,  are  modifying  his  own  ideal  of  perfection.  Let 
the  actions  and  the  schemes  at  least  be  definite,  if  possible,  even 


40  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

great.  The  child  is  seeing,  hearing,  and  telepathically  in  his 
subconscious  self  perceiving  and  appropriating  FOR  THE  FIRST 
TIME,  and  to  a  great  extent  from  you,  his  ideas  and  tendencies 
in  regard  to  the  "new"  world  he  is  in.  It  is  establishing  prece- 
dents. If  you  are  a  lawyer  or  a  judge,  you  will  appreciate 
the  significance  of  that.  Govern  yourself,  if  possible,  that 
the  child's  list  of  precedents  will  not  be  a  category  of  vague 
and  petty  and  devious  items. 

Thru  psychology  the  business  executive  realizes  in  his 
relations  toward  "connections"  and  subordinates,  that  through- 
out the  complexities  of  business  life  there  is  one  simple  unity 
easily  understood  if  sympathetic  attention  be  directed  toward 
it.  That  simple,  easily  learned  unity,  is  Human  Nature.  Its 
god  is  integrity;  its  devil  is  selfishness.  Neither  its  god  nor 
its  devil  can  be  done  away  with,  but  the  best  aim  in  business, 
according  to  psychology,  is  to  make  selfishness  subservient  to 
integrity.  Those  executives  and  captains  of  industry  who  have 
followed  that  principle  thru  thick  and  thin,  stand  at  the  top; 
and  among  those  who  stand  at  the  top,  they  are  the  best 
examples  of  business  success. 

The  clerk  will  see  thru  psychology  that  he  is  not  work- 
ing at  all  to  make  his  living.  He  will  see  that  he  is  where 
he  is  because  of  necessity.  Necessity  is  self-devised  and  self- 
induced.  It  is  not  a  void,  but  a  made  thing.  He  will  see, 
if  he  wishes  to  advance  and  to  progress,  that  he  must  manu- 
facture a  necessity  for  the  "raise."  A  determination  to  forge 
ahead  is  not  enough,  but  it  is  a  necessary  item.  But  over 
and  above  that  determination,  there  must  be  a  progressive 
accumulation  of  specific  knowledge  peculiar  to  the  station 
ahead  which  is  being  idealized.  When  that  accumulation  has 
grown  to  so  great  an  extent  that  "in  spirit"  you  are  already 
occupying  the  higher  position  and  are  homesick  for  it, — then 
you  may  work  in  your  old  position  with  cheer.  It  is  but  a 
matter  of  a  very  short  time  before  you'll  be  at  home. 

The  mechanic  need  not  think  because  his  employment  is 
so  thoroughly  concerned  with  physical  and  material  things, 
that  an  insight  into  psychology  does  not  touch  him  vitally. 
Psychology  after  all  is  one  big  department  in  the  science  of 
life,  and  a  mechanic  as  a  rule  is  not  dead.  In  my  experience, 
I  have  yet  to  find  a  community  of  mechanics  wherein  at  least 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  41 

75  per  cent  are  not  either  active  or  latent  inventors.  The 
latent  ones  are  kept  so  by  their  own  inertness,  due  to  a  kind 
of  hypnosis  of  "weight,"  I  suppose,  that  may  or  may  not  be 
caused  by  a  sort  of  psychic  reaction  from  the  very  metals 
handled.  A  thorough  grounding  in  the  facts  regarding  mental 
influence  would  serve  to  wake  them  up.  We  are  not  yet  a 
quarter  thru  with  mechanical  inventions,  great  as  the  progress 
has  been  in  the  last  half-century. 

The  laborer  will  find  his  lot  ameliorated  by  an  applica- 
tion of  psychological  laws.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the 
roughest  laborers  often  have  a  keen  intuitional  appreciation 
of  Natural  Law.  Such  knowledge  with  them  often  is  made 
void  of  good  effects,  however,  because  of  ignorance  of  con- 
ventional culture,  tradition,  etc.,  which  latter  in  turn  act  with 
the  power  of  veritable  gods  on  other  strata  of  society.  Psy- 
chology does  its  bit  to  bridge  the  gap,  for  it  shows  that  the 
methods  of  advance,  of  growth,  of  progress,  are  the  same 
with  one  member  of  the  race  as  with  the  other.  The  impedi- 
ments of  worry,  anxiety,  fear,  etc.,  for  instance,  will  "play 
hell"  with  a  laborer  in  his  life  and  environment  in  much  the 
same  destructive  way  that  it  will  act  in  the  life,  home  and 
environment  of  the  millionaire. 

Professional  people  and  artists  are  found  in  great  num- 
bers as  the  keenest  students  of  psychology.  They  suffer  some 
handicap  because  of  their  vocabulary,  however.  Often  they 
play  hide-and-seek  with  words.  For  instance,  a  destructive 
emotion  is  poison,  it  is  just  as  deadly  if  we  shift  words  and 
call  it  temperament,  or  incompatibility,  or  neurosis.  The  "sen- 
sitiveness" about  which  some  of  them  take  pride,  is  selfishness. 
Take  any  person  extremely  susceptible  to  petty  annoyance, — 
tear  off  the  disguise,  and  you  find  an  extremely  selfish  person. 
It  is  not  that  we  are  trying  to  slide  out  of  a  difficult  situation 
by  preaching  altruism  and  ethics — but  merely  pointing  out 
with  the  finger  of  psychology  why  some  professional  people 
are  real  (not  merely  financial)  successes,  and  why  others  are 
not. 

In  all  progress  toward  achievement,  whether  socially,  or 
with  the  ideal  of  business  success,  realize  that  you  have  unlim- 
ited power,  but  that  this  unlimited  power  can  act  only  thru 
the  efficiency  of  your  mental  influence.  If  the  mind  is  trained, 


42  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

and  its  influence  is  for  "increase,"  for  certainty,  for  success, 
the  power  will  never  fail.  Think  definitely  and  with  con- 
tinuity. I've  known  imbeciles  to  think  of  sublime  things.  It 
does  them  no  good  because  they  cannot  establish  in  them- 
selves either  definiteness  or  continuity.  The  monkey  is  clever, 
but  it  has  not  evolved  one  bit  since  recorded  human  history, 
because  it  utterly  lacks  continuity.  It  plays  with  the  sand  one 
second,  the  next  second  it  is  in  the  topmost  branch  of  the 
tree,  and  the  next  moment  it  is  grimacing  and  scratching  at 
the  bite  of  a  flea  with  one  hand  while  distractedly  reaching 
for  a  succulent  beetle  with  the  other.  Is  that  a  picture  or  even 
a  logical  caricature  of  your  mental  regime?  If  so,  for  good- 
ness sake,  change  it.  Ideals  and  sublime  objects  of  thought 
are  not  half  so  valuable  psychologically,  as  the  establishment 
of  definiteness,  integrity,  and  continuity.  I'd  rather  have  a 
Darwin  tell  me  about  the  habits  of  the  angle  worm  than  listen 
to  the  sermon  some  illiterate  dodo  of  a  preacher  might  pour 
into  my  ear.  Again,  I'd  rather  listen  to  the  ideas  of  a  Tal- 
madge,  or  a  Cardinal  Newman^  than  to  the  "Truth  From  the 
Other  Side"  by  some  greasy,  undisciplined  and  wilfully  ignor- 
ant person,  for  some  strange  reason  called  a  "medium." 

These,  then,  are  a  few  of  the  fundamental  things  to  con- 
sider, and  to  seek  to  apply  while  pursuing  further  knowledge 
of  "applied  psychology." 


LESSON  III. 
VITAL  ENERGY  AND  CELL  CONSCIOUSNESS 

IN  a  vague,  harmless  and  useless  sort  of  way,  everyone 
knows  about  "vitality."  We  speak  of  a  person  as  being 
full  of  "pep," — meaning  by  that,  that  the  other  is  to  under- 
stand what  we  mean.  If  pressed  for  a  definition,  we  may 
mean  one  of  a  hundred  things.  The  person  accused  of  posses- 
sing vitality  and  "pep,"  we  might  find,  may  have  come  under 
that  suspicion  only  thru  loudness  or  incontinence  either  in 
speech,  dress  or  action.  Those  who  truly  possess  vitality  in 
abundant  measure  and  are  well-disposed  otherwise,  invariably 
have  also  that  indefinable  something  called  magnetism  or 
"charm."  Their  actions  are  effective — as  if  fraught  with 
more  significance  than  a  similar  action  by  another.  The 
speech  of  one  abounding  in  magnetism  carries  weight,  because 
it  enforces  activity  in  the  imagination  of  the  listener. 

The  vital  energy  may  or  may  not  work  out  as  physical 
strength.  Napoleon  was  truly  a  dynamo  of  vital  energy, 
exceedingly  magnetic,  and  yet  physically  he  was  by  no  means 
a  giant.  Mohammed,  who  by  help  of  his  mental  and  vital 
magnetism  inaugurated  a  system  of  religious  thought  which 
today  promises  to  engulf  all  the  Orient  with  the  possible  ex- 
ception of  the  Mongols,  himself  was  not  a  strong  man.  He 
was  puny  and  an  epileptic.  Loyola  founded  the  strongest  or- 
der within  the  Catholic  church  after  he  had  been  dismissed 
with  a  permanently  impaired  body  from  a  hospital.  These 
persons,  and  hundreds  like  them  in  the  world  today,  are  ex- 
amples of  all  that  is  tied  up  in  that  rather  obscure  phrase  which 
is  becoming  popular,—  "The  redirection  of  the  energy."  We 
shall  try  to  discuss  and  clarify  that  phrase  presently. 

In  the  meantime,  let  it  be  understood  that  no  one  knows 
exactly  what  vital  energy  is.  Neither  does  anyone  know 
exactly  what  electricity  is.  But  it  is  safer  to  hold  some  con- 
ception regarding  electricity,  conforming  to  its  known  actions 
and  possibly  explanatory  of  them,  than  to  deny  its  existence. 

43 


44  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

One  can  say  All  is  God,  God  is  Love,  Pain  is  Error,  grasp 
a  live  wire  after  a  trolley  accident,  and  be  electrocuted.  This 
may  cause  some  to  elevate  an  eyebrow,  but  whether  or  not 
the  eyebrow  is  elevated,  it  is  true — and  a  truth-resenting  mind 
is  not  progressing.  The  results  of  holding  erroneous  con- 
ceptions regarding  the  vital  energy  of  the  body,  may  for  all 
we  know,  prove  as  dangerous,  tho'  probably  not  so  spectacular, 
as  when  we  try  to  dissipate  the  results  of  electrical  action  by  a 
play  upon  abstractions. 

Indeed,  it  will  not  harm  matters  to  use  an  abstract  state- 
ment as  proof.  For  instance,  the  statement  that  every  known 
energy  and  power  in  the  universe  is  the  manifestation  of  one 
fundamental  and  universal  energy, — is  an  abstraction.  Yet 
it  seems  so  self-evident,  so  axiomatic  to  the  thinking  mind,  that 
science  does  not  hesitate  even  in  its  material  speculations  to 
acquiesce  to  it  as  a  prime  hypothesis.  Now,  our  simile,  used 
just  a  moment  ago,  becomes  more  valuable.  We  see  that  the 
very  electricity,  industrially  and  commercially  used,  which 
there  we  mentioned  by  indirection,  is  one  of  the  manifestations 
of  that  one  universal  energy.  We  imagine  it  to  be  about  the 
most  marvelous  discovery,  considering  the  almost  miraculous 
ramifications  of  its  uses,  that  man  ever  made  or  ever  will  make. 
And  yet  look  at  the  clumsy  wire  coil  around  the  magnet;  the 
ponderous  metallic  dynamo;  the  sloppy  storage  tanks  and  vats 
of  corroding  minerals !  Wonderful  things  can  be  accomplished 
with  the  energy  conveyed  by  the  cables  from  those  same  tanks. 
How  came  it  into  the  tanks?  It  was  transformed  into  a  con- 
ductible  energy,  we  hear  the  reply, — from  a  grosser  form  of 
non-conductible  power — from  steam  churning  the  pistons  of 
an  engine,  or  from  water  turning  mill-wheels  or  turbines. 

In  the  form  it  assumes  when  leaving  the  "power-house" 
it  is  a  very  different  thing.  Movements  of  great  force  were 
available  from  the  energy  before  it  was  transformed  into 
electricity,  the  turning  of  wheels  for  manufacture,  for  trans- 
portation, etc.  But  once  the  same  energy  has  been  turned  into 
electrical  energy,  those  movements  are  at  once  dropped  down 
to  the  bottom  of  the  list  of  things  that  it  can  perform,  as  the 
least  important.  We  find  that  energy  so  transformed  can  be 
turned  into  light,  into  heat,  into  a  chemical  agent  and  reagent, 
into  a  transmitting  agent  for  sound  as  in  the  telephone,  into 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  45 

a  medium  for  the  transmission  of  other  impulses  as  in  the 
telegraph;  to  make  opacity  transparent  as  in  the  X-ray;  to 
detect  impulses  in  a  field  of  energy  more  subtle  than  itself,  as 
in  the  wireless  apparatus. 

How  Do  WE  APPROPRIATE  ENERGY? 

We  live  and  move  and  have  our  being  not  only  in  an 
ocean  of  universal  intelligence,  but  likewise  in  an  ocean  of 
energy.  By  all  the  acts  and  functions  which  go  to  make  up 
the  mere  act  of  living,  we  appropriate  each  one,  according  to 
his  mentally  fixed  standard,  our  quota  of  this  energy.  Any 
person  who  says  he  has  not  enough  energy  and  vitality  is  lying, 
for  in  truth  any  person  has  a  universe  full  of  it  at  his  disposal, 
and,  if  not  too  greedy,  that  should  be  enough.  It  is  as  if 
a  sardine  in  the  middle  of  the  Pacific  Ocean  were  to  complain 
about  the  lack  of  water. 

How  Do  WE  TRANSFORM  IT? 

But  we  forget  that  each  and  every  one  of  us  is  a  peram- 
bulating and  walking  transforming  power  house  in  a  universal 
Niagara  of  energy, — an  energy  so  terrific  that  every  visible 
form  of  it  is  but  a  weak  reflection  of  some  principle  in  it. 
Psychology  would  bid  us  recall  its  only  dogma  at  this  point, 
that  Man  is  Not  a  physical  being, — but  a  psychic  being  living 
in  a  physical  machine.  All  the  transforming,  therefore,  must 
be  psychically  done.  Your  quota  is  always  the  amount  you 
can  transform.  All  psychical  action  takes  place  in  accordance 
with  the  kind  of  thought  you  think  and  the  manner  in  which 
you  think  it, — in  accordance  with  the  emotion  or  mood  you 
entertain  and  .the  amount  of  control  you  exercise  during  its 
entertainment. 
A  COMMON  "SNAG" 

To  hold  a  "small  calibre"  conception  in  regard  to  that 
energy,  therefore,  limits  its  action  down  to  the  level  of  your 
erroneous  notion.  When  brought  down  to  so  base  a  level  of 
action,  it  then  disappoints,  sickens,  thwarts  and  even  kills  you. 
Error  kills  the  person  who  nurtures  it,  even  if  the  person 
worships  the  error  and  calls  it  Truth,  Religion,  or  Science. 
Altho'  the  energy  in  the  ether  and  in  the  air  is  superlatively 
powerful,  yet  it  is  so  delicate  and  subtle,  that  even  our  thoughts 
in  regard  to  it,  or  in  regard  to  anything  else,  swerve  it,  direct 


46  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

it,  bind  or  release  its  action.  If  we  ignore  it,  we  are  as  the 
fish  denying  the  presence  of  water.  It  is  fortunate  only  that 
our  ignoring  of  it  does  not  lessen  the  quantity  available  for 
others,  any  more  than  it  would  matter  if  some  poor  lone  fish 
were  to  ignore  the  existence  of  the  water  in  which  it  swims. 

THE  MACHINERY  FOR  TRANSFORMATION 

Once  more,  to  re-enter  into  the  power  house  illustration. 
Man  is  a  psychic  power  house.  That  is  to  say,  with  each 
breath  he  breathes,  he  is  imbibing  this  energy,  and  every 
mechanism  in  his  being,  psychic,  ghostly  if  you  will,  as  well 
as  physical,  sets  about  to  transform  it  into  something  as 
specifically  characteristic  of  himself  as  commercial  electricity 
is  characteristic  of  the  concrete  power  house  at  the  foot  of 
the  waterfall.  He  is  subconsciously  converting  it  into  human 
electricity, — vitality  and  strength,  whether  physical,  moral, 
mental,  psychic, — or  all  combined.  The  energy  taken  in,  we 
saw,  is  the  source  or  creator  of  all  other  energies.  Hence, 
it  is  probably  a  reasonable  surmise  that  the  physically  creative 
organs  and  their  psychic  correspondences  specialize  this  current 
in  the  first  place.  It  is  then  ready  for  the  use  and  the  direction 
of  the  imagination,  desire,  and  will  of  the  individual. 

If  the  specializing  functions  are  abused,  impairment  will 
result.  If  I  went  into  a  power  house,  at  the  foot  of  Niagara 
Falls,  and  deliberately  vandalized  the  most  important  unit  of 
machinery  in  the  place  for  the  mere  sensuous  joy  of  hearing  the 
wheels  hum  or  to  watch  the  sparks  fly,  the  wires  from  that 
plant  would  not  thereafter  carry  as  much  electricity  as  wires 
from  other  power  houses.  But  let  us  look  closely  just  what 
goes  to  make  up  vandalism  in  the  human  power  house.  Is  it 
the  organs  and  act  of  creation  plus  the  various  perversions 
and  inversions  of  the  latter?  Is  it  the  oft-quoted  "conspiracy 
of  silence"  on  the  part  of  parents,  and  the  consequent  forcing 
of  little  May  and  little  Jimmie  to  gather  furtively,  information 
most  important  to  later  health  and  peace  of  mind?  Is  it  all 
the  current  rasping  about  purity,  the  upshot  of  which  seems 
to  be  the  doing  away  with  physiology  by  legislation?  Is  it  the 
"double"  standard  that  says  man  may  indulge  the  lust  of  his 
eyes  but  that  woman  must  not? 
"SABOTAGE"  IN  THE  POWER  HOUSE 

Humankind  is  suffering  from  a  vandalism  that  is  being 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  47 

currently  perpetrated  in  this  regard.  Of  this  there  can  be  little 
doubt,  if  we  look  around.  Only  20  per  cent  of  adults  have 
really  anywhere  near  the  normal  and  abundant  quota  of 
physical  and  mental  vitality  to  carry  on  the  business  of  living 
successfully.  But  in  regard  to  the  popular  notion  that  crim- 
inal tendencies,  insanity,  etc.,  for  the  most  part,  originate  in 
the  perverse  practices,  we  bear  in  mind  conclusions  of  Jung, 
Silberer,  and  Dr.  White — the  latter's  authoritative  review  of 
causes  for  sub-normality  in  the  federal  prisons  of  the  United 
States,  dismisses  perverse  practices  out  of  the  possible  category 
with  a  brief  paragraph  of  about,  six  lines.  There  is  nothing 
to  it.  But  there  is  a  great  deal  to  the  diabolical  fears  and 
bugaboos  parrotted  down  from  one  generation  of  ignoramusses 
to  the  next,  usually  during  those  years  when  a  child  is  still 
miraculously  susceptible  to  suggestion, — picturing  in  pictures 
that  arise  from  Hell  "what  will  happen"  if  the  child  should 
now,  or  at  any  future  time  "do"  this  or  that.  There  is  an 
item  of  real  vandalism,  and  there  is  no  need  to  mystify  our- 
selves with  conjectures.  Undue  shaming  of  a  child,  if  ever 
as  a  race  we  develop  sense,  will  be  penalized  as  murder  is  now 
penalized. 

A  child  rushed  up  to  its  mother  to  know  the  meaning  of 
an  indecent  word  she  had  heard.  (Why  are  there  indecent 
words,  anyway?  What,  after  all,  is  the  difference  between  a 
belly  and  an  abdomen,  or  between  a  gut  and  an  intestine?  In 
older  civilizations  the  ribald  song  was  composed,  and  could 
only  be  composed  of  the  same  words  used  in  the  sophist's 
academy,  the  orator's  rostrum,  or  the  theatre.)  The  child 
was  agog  with  desire  for  information.  The  mother  slapped  it 
violently  and  sent  it  whimpering  to  bed.  That  mother,  no 
matter  how  saintly  her  deportment  might  have  been  in  the 
street,  in  society,  or  in  the  church,  by  that  action  proved  her- 
self an  indecent  woman.  By  that  inadvertence,  surely,  she 
transferred  her  shame  to  the  child.  Shame  is  the  mould  on 
mental  filth.  Filth  of  that  kind  is  a  matter  of  self-devised 
and  self-inflicted  attitudes.  No  act  or  fact  in  Nature  is  either 
pure  or  impure.  It  is  one's  own  motive,  character,  attitude 
and  thought  that  makes  of  it  for  any  given  individual  one  or 
the  other.  \i  one  has  nothing  to  transfer  to  the  child  but 
anxieties  and  prejudices  and  bugaboos  in  regard  to  sex  mat- 


PSYCHOLOGY — PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

ters,  it  is  probably  a  thousand  times  better  to  keep  up  with 
the  "conspiracy  of  silence"  than  to  break  it.  If  our  minds 
are  continually  clogged  with  such  mental  debris, — and  if  it 
is  true  that  the  condition  of  the  body  reflects  the  condition 
of  the  mind, — here  then  is  one  of  the  main  causes  of  all 
that  train  of  self-poisonings,  constipations,  atrophies  and  mal- 
formations, physical  and  mental,  which  go  to  make  up  the 
dictionary  of  human  ills.  Elimination  of  mental  debris  is  as 
necessary  as  the  elimination  of  physical  waste. 

SPECULATIVE  DEFINITIONS  AND  COMMENT 

The  cosmic  universal  energy,  first  translated  or  trans- 
formed into  human  terms,  again  is  called  by  various  names 
and  descriptives.  Some  bluntly  call  it  the  sex  urge,  which  is 
incomplete  and  deceptive,  tho'  certainly  in  part  true.  Some 
philosophers  say  it  can  all  be  summed  up  in  the  word  "desire." 
Schopenhauer  called  it  the  "Will  To  Be."  The  Psycho- 
analysts call  it  by  the  arbitrary,  but  rather  expressive  word, 
"The  Libido."  This  libido,  like  all  other  faculties  now  'sub- 
conscious, must  in  the  course  of  evolution  be  made  utterly  sub- 
servient to  the  enlightened  human  will.  Even  in  the  present 
juncture  of  human  development,  it  is  the  accompanist  or  vital- 
izer  for  every  action  whether  physical  or  mental.  Without 
the  control  of  the  will,  it,  like  mind,  is  never  quiescent,  but  fol- 
lows along  the  grooves  of  old  habits,  old  fears,  old  memories, 
striving  to  give  them  life  and  even  physical  manifestation,— 
such  as  the  deposits  of  acids,  colonies  of  "rebel"  cell  growths, 
tumors,  malformations,  etc.  From  the  literature  of  mysticism, 
plus  the  better  works  on  psycho-analysis,  one  Would  think  that 
it  is  this  very  energy  which  acts  most  powerfully  in  making 
of  man  a  saint,  an  adept  in  the  manipulation  of  occult  forces, 
or  in  the  orient,  the  holy  yogi.  To  quote  from  one  of  our 
former  books,— -"When  stain  (meaning  all  that  is  conveyed 
by  the  term  'mental  debris'  in  former  paragraphs)  is  no  longer 
possible,  the  same  force  of  the  'libido'  seeking  higher  expres- 
sions becomes  the  medium  of  illumination.  Instead  of  barrier 
to  'seeing'  and  understanding,  it  becomes  aperture  for  apprecia- 
tion and  comprehension  of  seen  and  unseen  realities.  Instead 
of  a  creative  matrix  of  woes,  while  defiled  by  our  fears  and 
anxieties  and  selfish  indulgences,  it  now  transcends  itself  into 
a  tractable  power  for  tolerant  understanding  and  keen  discern- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  49 

ment.  Erotomania  becomes  spiritual  passion  for  the  ideal, 
an  ally,  a  motive  power  aiding  in  yet  greater  transcensions 
over  material  limitations  of  mind  and  body." 

However,  this  is  a  mere  "outline"  and  a  more  practical 
view  of  this  phase  of  "energy  direction"  would  be  more  to 
the  point.  A  careful  and  considerate  discussion  of  the  subject 
would  require  many  volumes,  and  then  would  leave  the  mat- 
ter incomplete.  Psychology,  far  from  claiming  the  "last  word" 
in  the  matter,  far  from  dogmatizing,  declares  only  that  dogma 
is  fatal.  Let  us  see,  however,  before  leaving  the  subject,  if 
we  can  gather  anything  of  help  from  the  following  picture: 
Is  THERE' ANYTHING  "To"  THIS  PARABLE? 

We  will  imagine  a  man  of  uncertain  age, — he  may  be 
young,  or  he  may  be  old,  it  does  not  matter, — stationed  as 
the  lone  caretaker  of  a  great  house.  He  seems  always  to  have 
been  a  prisoner  therein,  and  within  the  walls  that  surround 
the  grounds.  Since  "finding"  himself  here  he  has  known  only 
the  kitchen,  that  is  to  say,  the  "utility  room,"  of  the  place. 
He  has  available  an  oil  well  in  a  part  of  the  grounds,  and  a 
distillation  manufactory  in  fairly  good  order  distills  as  much 
of  it  as  he  needs  into  the  form  of  gasoline.  This  he  uses  to 
warm  himself,  to  cook  his  food,  to  minister  to  his  physical  or 
animal  wants  and  needs.  We  will  fancy  that  there  is  an  exhil- 
iration  about  the  distilled  product,  which  tempts  him  to  com- 
mit excesses  and  debauches  with  it.  But  he  soon  learns  that 
.because  the  reactions  to  such  actions  are  rather  drastic,  it  is 
best  to  limit  them,  and  he  finds  indeed  that  they  are  self- 
limiting.  He  was  content  for  a  long  time  to  minister,  with 
the  energy  available  from  the  fluid  distillations,  only  to  his 
creature  comforts,  his  physical  and  animal  needs  and  wants. 
But  he  is  no  longer  content  to  do  so.  Something  about  the 
impalpable  exhiliration  emanating  and  influencing  him,  does 
not  allow  him  to  rest.  Discontent  drives  him  to  investigate 
further  into  the  house.  Presently  he  finds  a  room  containing  a 
library.  It  is  cold  and  the  books  are  covered  with  the  dust  of 
ages.  He  now  has  a  new  use  for  the  heating  which  his  supply 
of  the  fuel  oil  warrants.  He  builds  in  the  necessary  piping 
and  installs  his  radiators,  and  finds  that  to  the  extent  he 
removes  the  dust  from  the  books,  to  that  extent  can  he  spend 
his  time  profitably  indeed.  He  does  not  cease  using  the  com- 


50  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

modity  for  strictly  utilitarian  purposes, — but  by  no  means  does 
he  neglect  the  new  opportunities  which  it  has  opened  up  to 
him. 

Perchance  in  the  library  room,  he  now  finds  a  book 
descriptive  of  the  very  house  in  which  he  is  stationed.  He 
learns  things  about  it  he  never  suspected.  Suppose  that  he 
puts  items  he  reads  together,  and  finally  finds  a  way  to  pick 
the  locks  of  still  other  rooms.  Maybe  he  finds  a  music  room. 
He  improves  his  opportunity  there, — warming  and  lighting 
the  room  with  still  the  same  supply — which  now  he  finds  help- 
ing him  in  three  departments  of  his  "house," — namely,  the 
physical  or  utilitarian, — the  mental,  or  "library,'-'  and  his 
sense  of  the  aesthetic,  or  the  "music  room."  He  neglects  none 
of  these.  Presently,  because  he  is  diligent,  he  actually  evolves 
a  way  of  converting  the  gasoline  into  power  thru  a  machine— 
and  that  power  thru  still  other  converters  and  dynamos,  in 
turn  he  learns  how  to  transform  into  electricity.  He  finds 
queer,  half-built,  incomplete  but  ingenious  machines  every- 
where he  looks  now,  for  one  becomes  strangely  intuitive  as  one 
sympathetically  and  earnestly  explores  the  interior  of  the  house 
called  "consciousness."  He  finds  an  X-ray  machine,  incom- 
plete probably,  but  in  time  he  completes  it,  and  then  he  dem- 
onstrates to  himself  that  the  walls  of  his  house  are  not  a  totally 
hopeless  prison,  for  when  the  machine  is  in  good  trim,  he  can 
see  thru  those  self-same  walls.  He  may,  because  he  has  con- 
verted his  gasoline  into  electricity,  even  find  and  use  a  wire- 
less apparatus.  Then  his  imprisonment  is  truly  ended,  for  his 
caretaking  of  the  house  becomes  a  pleasure.  He  can  now  send 
and  receive  messages  to  and  fro  with  other  caretakers  of  such 
houses.  It  may  be  that  occasionally  he  can  even  send  mes- 
sages to  the  "Landlord"  or  to  one  who  knows  everything  pos- 
sible about  house  construction,  and  knows  the  laws  of  con- 
struction. He  will  begin  then  to  comprehend  laws  of  archi- 
tecture— the  secrets  of  dynamics.  As  he  goes  on,  he  sees  his 
only  source  of  dissatisfaction  and  confinement  was  not  the 
walls.  Neither  was  his  unhappy  condition  entirely  caused  by 
his  ignorant  (tho'  legitimate)  use  of  the  "gasoline."  The 
cause  of  his  confinement  was:  pinning  down  of  its  use  exclu- 
sively to  the  satisfaction  of  bodily  needs  and  appetites. 

In  short,  the  subconscious  mind,  because  of  Natural  Law, 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  51 

is  under  the  compulsion  of  progressively  refining  and  extending 
the  channels  of  usefulness  of  "the  libido,"  with  the  ideal  of  an 
all-knowing  and  perfect  human  being  always  before  it. 

Occasionally  that  urge  By  the  Same  Natural  Law  is  for 
the  act  of  physical  creation,  according  to  your  sex  polarity. 
This  may  be  deplorable  in  the  eyes  of  those  who  are  quite  sure 
that  they  are  more  proper  and  more  pure  than  Nature,  but 
Nature  evidently  is  not  sending  in  payment  of  regular  dues 
to  the  Purity  League.  She  does  not  act  according  to  the  code 
of  the  Puritan,  in  fact,  she  playfully  afflicted  the  Puritan  with 
dyspepsia,  witchcraft  and  gloom.  Nature  is  ever  ready  to  aid 
those  who  study  her  to  become  her  masters.  She  is  incapable 
of  helping  those  who  arbitrarily  legislate  against  her  without 
any  attempt  to  understand.  Laws  in  this  regard  are  only  one 
more  sly  attempt  on  the  part  of  man  to  escape  the  painful 
necessity  of  thinking.  An  unworldly  pose  will  not  answer  the 
purpose.  It  also  is  a  cheap  substitute  for  thought.  And  evo- 
lution decrees  that  we  think,  and  act  in  accordance  with  our 
best  thought.  No  excuse  will  palliate  swerving  from  this 
course.  We  dare  not  make  a  dogma  nor  an  unrepealable  law 
even  of  our  best  thought.  We  can  act  in  accordance  with  it> 
but  we  must  hold  ourselves  a  living  question  mark  for  further 
illumination,  individually  and  racially,  or  we  stagnate,  rot,  01 
are  enslaved  by  the  uncivilized.  We  must  learn  to  have  an 
ideal  and  a  standard,  to  be  true  to  the  ideal  and  the  standard, 

but  to  CHANGE  THE  IDEAL  AND  STANDARD  WHEN  REASON  AND 
INTUITION  DICTATE. 

Probably  the  greatest  psychological  mistake  lies  in  men- 
tally pinning  this  nerve  energy  down  to  the  one  function  of 
propagation.  We  observed  formerly  that  it  has  no  recourse 
but  to  work  according  to  the  deepest  laid  personal  convictions. 
If  such  pinning  down  is  the  thought,  the  person  must  burn  in 
the  sexual  excitement  which  he  constantly  stirs  up  by  main- 
taining that  attitude.  Moreover,  tho'  not  given  to  violence 
personally,  I  can  sympathize  with  the  husband  or  wife  of  such 
a  person  giving  the  other  vigorous  treatments  with  a  baseball 
bat,  and  not  absent  treatments  either.  That  attitude  is  the 
cause  of  untold  misery  and  unhappiness  in  domestic  life;  the 
chronic  mental  resentment  on  the  part  of  the  more  intelligent 
of  the  two  becomes  a  manufactory  in  time  of  neuroses  and  even 


52  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

physical  disease.  If  there  are  children,  they  are  truly  to  be 
pitied.  And  yet  bestiality  will  be  defended  often  as  not,  by  the 
person  sunken  in  it,  with  bible  quotations  and  what  not.  Prob- 
ably by  the  "unpardonable  sin,"  the  writers  of  that  book  meant 
the  dragging  down  of  its  texts  to  validate  bestiality.  If  not, 
at  least  I  hope  that  is  what  they  had  in  mind.  If  I  had  my 
way,  I  should  make  it  an  unpardonable  sin  to  quote  even  a 
Peruna  almanac  for  such  a  purpose. 

METAPHYSICS 

We  have  finished  for  the  time  with  the  subject  of  Vital 
Energy.  We  imagined  the  universe  as  flooded  with  an  ocean 
of  energy,  and  the  vital  energy  of  each  organized  life  as  a  cell 
therein.  Each  cell  is  of  the  same  original  power,  but  special- 
ized, "personalized,"  and  "transformed"  in  hundreds  of 
various  ways,  in  ways  enforced  by  the  kind  of  "machines"  you 
have  equipped  in  the  power  house  of  your  mind  and  emotions. 
Man,  psychically,  therefore,  can  be  considered  as  a  more  or 
less  evolved  cell  in  the  organism  called  the  universe. 

But  there  is  an  old  guiding  post  which  the  medieval 
scholars  used  in  all  their  efforts  of  learning,  consisting  of  the 
phrase  "As  above,  so  below."  It  means  to  say  that  anything 
true  of  the  bigness  of  things,  in  some  analogous  way  is  true 
in  the  littleness  of  things,  or  vice  versa.  So  we  find  that  the 
conception  of  man  being  a  cell  in  a  spiritually  organized  uni- 
verse, is  carried  out  in  miniature  quite  graphically  throughout 
the  physical  structure  not  only  of  man,  but  of  all  living 
organisms. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  psychology  to  teach  that  substance 
and  matter  are  subject  to  mental  law.  Mind  does  not  rule 
matter  intelligently,  however,  until  it  recognizes  its  own  pow- 
ers. Mere  assertion  and  affirmation  are  not  enough;  they  do 
not  constitute  knowledge  or  realization.  However,  when  we 
have  learned  to  see  and  cognize  matter  and  substance  in  terms 
of  the  energies  which  compose  them,  we  are  nearer  to  that 
mark.  For  we  see  that  the  subtlest  and  most  powerful  ener- 
gies, those,  in  fact,  which  are  the  sources  of  all  visible  ener- 
gies,— are  mentally  directed. 
WORLDS  OF  WHICH  "You"  ARE  GOD 

We  look  at  the  physical  body,  or  at  any  organ  or  tissue 
taken  therefrom,  and  it  seems  incomprehensible  how  so  gross 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  53 

a  lump  of  substance  can  in  anywise  be  influenced  by  mind. 
But  suppose  that  our  vision  had  the  acuteness  of  a  high- 
powered  microscope.  We  would  then  see  that  the  tissue  or 
the  organ  is  composed  of  millions  upon  millions  of  cells; 
world  upon  worlds  of  them.  Considering  their  infinitesimal 
minuteness,  they  are  mobile  in  their  sphere  about  as  much  as 
other  animals,  including  man,  are  in  theirs.  Thru  investiga- 
tion in  that  channel  of  science  which  has  devoted  itself  to 
researches  concerning  cell  life,  it  is  apparent  that  the  life  of 
the  cells  is  one  of  intelligence  and  direction.  H.  S.  Jennings, 
authority  in  this  field,  says:  "The  cell  shows  remarkable 
pertinacity  when  continuing  its  attempts  to  put  forth  efforts 
to  accomplish  this  (the  taking  of  food)  in  various  ways,  and 
it  shows  remarkable  pertinacity  in  continuing  its  attempts  to 
ingest  the  food  when  it  meets  with  difficulties.  Indeed,  the 
scene  could  be  described  in  much  more  vivid  and  interesting 
way  by  the  use  of  terms  still  more  anthropomorphic  in  ten- 
dency." 

The  cell  selects  and  absorbs  its  requirements  of  food  by 
wrapping  itself  around  the  particle  to  be  devoured.  It  appears 
to  possess  not  only  an  intelligence,  but  also  a  power  of  perfect 
response  to  its  desires  or  mental  stimuli.  If  it  is  in  need  of  a 
limb  for  some  special  purpose,  immediately  there  appears  a 
temporary  outgrowth  of  the  transparent  outer  layer  of  the 
soft  protoplasmic  body.  It  forms  a  gas  in  its  body  at  will  to 
rise  in  a  liquid,  or  as  readily  discharges  the  gas  to  sink  lower. 
It  immediately  creates  a  protective  shell  around  itself  if  placed 
in  water  containing  an  acid.  It  is  perceived  to  recognize  its 
enemies  and  either  fights  and  devours  them  or  hides  itself  for 
protection.  It  knows  its  kind.  It  seems  to  have  the  ability 
uto  be  what  it  wishes  to  be"  in  a  startling  and  literal  degree. 
The  muscle  cell  in  the  muscle  works  with  an  apparent  omnis- 
cience of  the  laws  of  expansion,  elasticity,  resilience  and  con- 
traction,— as  do  the  heart  cells.  The  glandular  cells  work 
with  just  as  miraculous  a  knowledge  of  secretions — thyroids, 
toxins,  digestive  fluids.  The  white  blood  corpuscles,  which  are 
cells,  labor  in  harmony  with  the  laws  of  food  absorption  and 
distribution.  The  brain  and  ganglion  cells  work  with  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  mechanisms  involved  in  the  effect  of  thought  and 
nerve  vibrations.  So  do  the  cells  not  only  have  memory  and 


54  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

intelligence,  but  they  have,  moreover,  the  specialized  knowl- 
edge of  their  particular  field  of  work.  And  according  to 
what  tendency  will  all  this  work,  of  a  million  different  kinds, 
be  done? 

The  elan  vital, — -the  vital  energy,  which  concerned  the 
first  half  of  this  chapter,  let  us  remember,  carries  in  solution 
the  psychic  chemicalization  of  your  thoughts  and  emotions,  in 
short  of  your  character.  That  elan  vital  of  yours,  that  vital 
energy,  is  appropriated  and  regarded  as  "life"  by  the  cells,  in 
the  same  way  that  you  regard  your  appropriation  of  the  uni- 
versal energy  as  your  life.  What  kind  of  a  universal  mind 
and  vitality  are  you  furnishing  to  your  subjects?  You  are 
their  universe  and  their  god.  You  are  the  supreme  being  so 
far  as  they  are  concerned.  If  by  anxiety  and  worries  and  all 
manner  of  exclusive  and  selfish  emotions  you  demand  of  them 
neuroses  and  blues,  they  cannot  do  otherwise  *but  obey  what  to 
them  is  a  divine  command;  moreover,  they  will  duly  build  for 
you  some  physical  defect.  Their  logic,  if  such  it  may  be  called, 
seems  to  run  in  this  wise:  "If  you  are  worried,  anxious,  blue, 
morbid, — surely  it  must  be  because  you  want  something  to 
warrant  these  attitudes.  Let  us  make  haste  to  bring  it  about 
forthwith." 

The  actions  of  cells,  their  display  of  definite  memory  and 
intelligence,  forces  us  to  the  conclusion  that  they  possess  not. 
only  a  vague  something  for  which  we  must  apologize  before 
we  call  it  consciousness;  they  possess  consciousness  imprinted 
with  an  accumulation  of  experience,  remembered  and  sequen- 
tial,— and  that  is  intelligence.  Not  only  their  work,  but  even 
their  play  (for  they  do  play,  as  can  be  proved  by  watching  that 
cell  known  as  the  "amoeba,"  readily  visible  under  the  micro- 
scope)— in  a  general  way  is  all  designed  for  the  growth  and 
maintenance  of  their  "universe,"  which  is  your  body.  Psy- 
chological insight  leads  inevitably  to  the  conclusion  that  there 
is  indeed  a  mental  or  conscious  side  to  all  matter.  Especially 
is  that  so  with  this  phase  of  matter  which  we  are  now  dis- 
cussing. For  convenience  we  may  call  this  phase  "physicality," 
composed  as  it  is  of  these  interesting  cells. 

From  an  analysis  of  the  construction  of  matter,  we  find 
that  the  constituents  of  the  cell  are,  as  we  all  know,  single 
atoms  and  molecules.  (Molecules  are  double,  triple,  etc.,  or 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  55 

"group"  atoms.)  Atoms,  as  also  is  now  conjectured  by 
science,  are  infinitesimal  "solar  systems," — an  electron  of  one 
polarity  acting  as  the  sun,  and  numbers  of  electrons  of  the 
opposite  polarity  acting  as  planets.  The  whirling  of  these 
electronic  mites 'is  so  intensely  rapid  that  in  the  atom  we  have 
the  first  illusion  or  apparency  of  that  solidness  which  in  higher 
syntheses  becomes  a  major  characteristic  of  all  material  or 
physical  substance.  The  cell,  as  the  second  or  third  synthesis 
of  such  vortices,  must  of  course  be  in  possession  of  the  collective 
life  and  consciousness  of  its  component  atoms.  Says  Her- 
schel :  "All  that  has  been  predicated  of  atoms,  their  attrac- 
tions and  repulsions,  according  to  the  primary  laws  of  their 
being,  only  becomes  intelligible  when  we  assume  the  presence 
of  mind."  Thus,  as  the  atom  is  seen  to  be  impelled  in  part 
by  some  sort  of  memory,  so  the  cell,  possessing  the  aggregate 
memory  of  its  atoms,  must  be  said  to  have  some  kind  of  intel- 
ligence; it  stands  to  reason  that  it  has  more  than  mere  con- 
sciousness,— it  has,  to  be  exact,  also  the  result  of  experience, 
not  only  its  Own,  but  of  its  components.  It  must  have  a  more 
complex  memory  and  a  more  complete  one  than  its  component 
forms.  Hence  all  that  Herschel  says  of  the  atom  may  be 
raised  to  its  third  power  and  applied  even  more  appropriately 
to  the  cell. 

The  understanding  of  the  cell  to  be  a  mental  as  well  as 
physical  creature  shows  to  the  student  the  actual  point  of  im- 
pingement for  the  suggestions  or  thought  attitudes  that  sink 
deeply  enough.  The  cells  have  no  working  orders,  no  initia- 
tive but  that.  They  are  the  visible  beings  visibly  carrying  out 
your  "orders,"  for  illness  or  for  health,  for  an  efficient  or  for 
a  deficient  body.  A  thorogoing  study  of  this  phase  alone, 
inclusive  of  correspondences  and  analogies,  will  give  an  under- 
standing of  the  "how"  of  the  bald  head  here,  the  abundant 
locks  over  there,  the  narrow  six-footer  and  the  genial,  broad 
four-foot-one-er ;  the  shape  of  the  features  and  head,  the  cast  of 
the  countenance,  good  looks  or  bad,  brown  eyes,  black  or  blue, 
the  gait,  the  posture,  the  general  decency  or  general  "cussed- 
ness"  of  any  given  person.  In  the  cell  we  see  a  perfect  ex- 
ample of  the  correlation  of  thought  and  action.  Its  body 
always  corresponds  with  the  attitude  of  its  mind.  Given  a 
thought  that  it  needs  a  limb  or  three  or  four  limbs,  the  limbs 


56  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

at  once  appear  as  projections.  If  the  need  was  but  temporary, 
the  limbs  are  reabsorbed  in  the  globular  body.  If  the  need 
is  impressed  upon  it  as  permanent,  the  limbs  so  produced  re- 
main permanently.  It  endows  itself  in  just  such  fashion  with 
whatever  limbs,  adaptabilities  and  capabilities  it  needs,  and  in 
giving  birth  or  division  to  new  cells,  it  is  shown  that  these 
capabilities  become  fixed  in  the  type. 

But  psychology  shows  that  for  the  development  of  some 
desirable  capability,  or  the  elimination  of  another  that  is  not 
desirable,  the  urge  must  start  with  you,  as  a  conscious,  think- 
ing "Lord"  of  your  cell  universe.  Altho'  the  ability  of  the 
cells  is  such  that  they  can  build  into  your  body,  brain,  nerves 
and  psychic  organism  anything  that  you  desire,  still  before 
they  can  do  anything  like  that  for  you,  you  must  desire  it 
definitely,  consistently,  and  persistently.  You  must  learn  to 
master  and  to  eliminate  those  desires  and  mental  attitudes 
which  will  conflict  with  the  main  desire.  You  must  learn  to 
uncover  biases,  fears,  and  other  sources  of  weakness  which 
are  asleep  or  dreaming  in  you.  You  must  learn  to  throw  out 
unadmitted  envies,  hatreds,  greeds,  and  other  sources  of  in- 
justice to  others,  which,  tho'  repudiated  by  you  consciously, 
may  still  be  dominating  you  unconsciously. 

Millions  of  cells  are  dying  and  being  born  in  the  system 
constantly.  In  the  interval  between  its  "death"  and  "rebirth," 
why  is  it  not  probable  that  the  mind  of  the  cell  is  merged  with 
your  (aggregate)  subconscious  mind?  If  that  is  so,  then  it 
will  be  reborn  with  a  saturation  of  what  it  has  bathed  in,— 
and  in  that  interval  it  has  bathed  in  your  predominating  ideas 
and  qualities, — in  the  deepest  hopes  and  fears,  in  the  funda- 
mental urges  and  repulsions  underlying  your  character.  It  is 
reborn  of  the  protoplasm  of  the  bodily  system  physically ;  it  is 
reborn  of  your  "elan  vital,"  your  vital  energy  psychically. 
With  each  such  "rebirth"  it  embodies  more  specifically  time 
after  time  the  actual  physical  and  mental  and  psychic  results 
to  which  the  person  is  progressively  entitling  himself. 

The  entire  physical  body  thus  renews  itself  in  not  more 
than  five  years,  and  the  probability  is  that  the  transformation 
takes  place  in  less  time  than  that.  It  is  certain  that  character 
and  faculty  transformation  can  and  does  take  place  in  less 
time  than  that  under  intelligent  and  enthusiastic  effort.  But 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  57 

what  is  the  good  of  the  transformation  if  the  new  cells  must 
multiply  and  continue  working  along  preconceived  ideas,  per- 
sonal and  racial  habits,  and  all  the  doleful  horde  of  current 
superstitions? 

It  is  erroneous  to  imagine  that  only  New  Thoughtists, 
Christian  Scientists,  Theosophists,  Spiritualists,  and  the  like, 
appreciate  the  value  of  mental  states  as  related  to  physical 
welfare.  The  most  authoritative  representatives  of  science 
have  swung  over  to  a  vivid  appreciation  of  the  psychological 
factors  in  all  biological  phenomena.  The  leaders  of  medical 
science  especially  are  by  no  means  ignorant  of  the  significant 
things  pointed  out  in  this  chapter.  It  is  only  the  numerous 
tribe  of  dodos  (the  dodo  is  a  big,  foolish  bird  now  extinct,  but 
so  foolish  that  it  probably  does  not  know  it)  among  the 
medical  profession  who  would  deny  the  influence  of  mind  over 
the  cell  activities  of  the  body.  In  the  "bulk"  sense,  how- 
ever, science,  not  excluding  medicine,  has  been  and  is  yet  an 
unconscionable  laggard.  Why  and  how?  Because  it  strives 
only  in  what  seems  to  be  a  joking  way  to  do  materially 
(glands,  serums,  inoculations,  etc.)  what  must  be  done,  if  it  is 
ever  to  be  done  at  all,  with  more  appreciation  of  the  psychic 
and  mental  laws  involved.  We  are  speaking  of  the  inability 
which  "bulk"  science  shows,  to  get  away  from  the  popular 
dogma  and  superstition  that  it  is  "natural"  for  the  human 
being,  immediately  the  period  of  youth  is  past,  to  spend  the 
remainder  of  his  life  under  impairment. 

The  deductions  of  psychology  and  the  observations  of 
physiology  have  been  both  drawn  upon  to  afford  the  picture 
of  cell  life  and.  its  significance  as  here  presented.  If  we  can 
boil  down  any  reasonable  conclusion  therefrom,  surely  that 
conclusion  will  not  be  hostile  to  the  idea  that  renewal  and 
rejuvenation  of  the  body  is  practicable.  But  in  making  any 
experiment  or  effort  at  such  practice,  we  can  now  see  how 
futile  would  be  the  endeavor  if  we  eliminate  the  factor  of 
mental  attitude.  The  internal  operations  of  the  subconscious 
mind,  once  understood,  the  subject  becomes  more  clear.  If 
you  are  subjecting  the  vital  energy  of  the  body  to  cyclones  of 
temper,  to  drouths  of  depression,  floods  and  storms  of  emo- 
tionalism, and  the  destructive  fires  of  greed  and  passion,  then 
a  world  of  surface  thinking  and  wishing  for  health  or  youth- 


58  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

fulness  will  do  you  no  good.  Why?  Because  your  thinking 
and  wishing  then  acts  only  as  a  disguise  or  cover,  under  which 
your  "self-aging"  or  "self-destruction"  goes  on  more  virulently 
than  if  it  were  going  on  exposed. 

The  term  of  the  average  human  life  is  today  longer  than 
it  was  a  hundred  years  ago.  This  was  accomplished  by  an 
elimination  from  the  mind  of  man  of  the  debris  of  theological 
twaddle,  bigotry  and  superstition  piled  up  during  the  medieval 
period.  The  mind,  thus  partly  cleaned  up,  a  physical  cleaning 
up  appeared  as  a  reflection  of  that  first  or  "real"  house-clean- 
ing. Incomplete  and  unfinished  as  that  cleaning-up  was,  yet 
the  "reflection"  appeared  in  the  form  of  hygiene,  sanitation. 
Soap  and  water  replaced  musks  and  perfumes.  The  odor  of 
cleanliness  replaced  the  bogus  odor  of  sanctity. 

It  is  a  pity  that  the  main  bulk  of  scientists,  and  other 
"middleman"  leaders  of  thought,  have  not  yet  completely 
availed  themselves  of  the  splendid  data  and  theories  afforded 
by  psychology.  To  do  that  would  be  the  first  step  in  making 
human  life  more  ample  and  more  joyful  directly.  To  use 
science  in  the  improvement  of  machines  is  a  pursuit  to  the 
same  end,  it  is  true,  but  the  pursuit  by  that  method  is  Indirect. 
This  is  so  wrong,  now,  that  it  is  little  wonder  entire  communi- 
ties sporadically  attempt  demonstrations  of  physical  perfect- 
ability.  Bunglesome  as  many  such  efforts  prove  to  be,  the  in- 
tensity or  religious  zeal  of  them  can  be  condoned  when  it  is 
seen  that  guilt  of  a  great  delinquency  still  rests  with  those  in 
possession  of  scientific  knowledge  sufficient  to  improve  the 
fundamental  ideas  of  the  race  in  these  matters,  but  who  refuse 
to  do  so.  The  "conviction  of  the  race"  is  a  tough  taskmaster. 
The  race  conviction  right  there  proves  itself  to  be  stronger 
even  than  the  penetration  of  the  scientific  mind.  For  the  race 
conviction  is  able  to  steer  the  dodo  scientist's  penetration 
away  from  the  bogus  character  of  its  pet  superstition — which 
is — the  "naturalness"  of  human  impairment.  Having  sub- 
mitted to  that  trick  of  hypnotism,  the  scientist  in  the  face  of 
that  bugaboo  becomes  as  blunt  and  as  unreasoning  as  any 
other  imbecile  we  might  see  in  some  ten-cent  theatre  during 
the  act  of  Marvelous  Marvelo,  the  Hypnotist.  We  bring  him 
testimony  of  the  lower  kingdoms,  of  plant  and  animal  and 
cell — it  passes  unnoticed.  Analogy  of  a  sudden  becomes  inad- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  59 

missable.  Tho'  he  may  have  trained  his  brain  to  its  present 
scientific  proportions  by  the  power  of  his  thoughts,  yet  con- 
fronted with  that  particular  race  superstition,  his  child-like 
nature  (what  psycho-analysis  would  call  his  infantile  complex) 
takes  charge,  and  once  more  he  will  repeat  as  in  his  infancy 
that  thought  is  a  secretion  of  the  brain  as  bile  is  a  secretion  of 
the  liver. 

And  the  ordinary  person,  "even  as  you  and  I,"  continues 
to  find  out  the  truth  about  his  real  life  and  his  real  health 
through  experience  and  independent  study  such  as  this  presen- 
tation, only  because  the  unadmitted  working  hypothesis  of 
the  scientific  man  has  been  that  it  is  "natural"  for  human 
beings  more  or  less  chronically  to  be  sick  or  impaired. 

Leading  scientists  and  physicists  the  world  over  today 
are  postulating  a  psychological  basis  as  underlying  matter  and 
existence.  In  time  this  will  of  course  bring  logically  in  its  train 
the  "scientific"  corroboration  to  prove  thought  as  the  dynamic 
power  used,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  in  modifications  of 
that  existence.  Once  the  materialistic  bogey  even  yet  so  dear 
to  many  mediocre  scientists  and  practitioners  has  become 
odious  by  losing  in  fashion  and  orthodoxy,  ways  of  improve- 
ment will  open  more  widely.  .  And  such  changes  in  the  learned 
world  are  in  the  way  of  occurring  here  and  now.  It  seems, 
however,  t'hat  the  new  light,  in  spreading,  has  to  leap  from 
the  enlightened  leaders  of  science  and  thought  directly  to  the 
laymen,  unperceived  and  over  the  heads  of  the  "middleman." 
For  a  time  a  certain  "middleman"  portion  of  science  and  the 
professions  appears  inclined  to  remain  impervious. 


"I  do  not  believe  that  matter  is  inert,  acted  upon  by  an 
outside  force.  To  me  it  seems  that  every  atom  is  possessed 
by  a  certain  amount  of  primitive  intelligence." — Edison. 


LESSON  IV. 
THE  SUBCONSCIOUS  MIND 

IF  WE  observe  keenly,  we  find  that  but  a  very  small  frac- 
tion of  the  life  of  the  personality  results  from  a  direct 
effort  of  the  will.  The  blood  circulates  without  a  con- 
scious thought  directed  toward  it.  Breathing,  digestion,  assimi- 
lation and  elimination  all  "take  care  of  themselves."  These 
processes  are  automatic.  We  may  and  often  should  change 
or  modify  some  features  of  a  given  automatism — and  that  sort 
of  "modifying  for  the  better"  was  implied  in  the  recommen- 
dations set  down  about  the  proper  uses  of  Air,  Water,  Food, 
Exercise  and  Mental  Influence;  but  the  bodily  processes  are, 
and  will  remain  essentially  automatic. 

When  we  speak  of  anything  in  a  living  organism  as  being 
"automatic" — precisely  what  do  we  mean?  In  the  preceding 
chapters  we  observed  those  processes  of  organic  life  which  as 
a  rule  are  unnoticed, — which,  in  fact,  short  of  some  instrument 
that  would  combine  more  facilities  for  observation,  than  con- 
tained both  in  X-ray  and  microscope,  cannot  be  seen.  Viewing 
the  complexity  in  the  life  and  work  of  cells,  tissues,  nerves, 
muscles  and  organs,  we  had  to  admit  the  supervision  there  of 
mind  and  intelligence,  or  else  throttle  reason  and  deny  plain 
inference  from  observed  fact.  The  physical  organism  is  but 
an  aggregate  of  billions  of  minute  lives,  of  uncounted  legion- 
aries made  up  of  intelligent  workers.  Intelligent  tho'  they  be, 
something  directs  them  into  combining  their  efforts  in  groups. 
Something  specializes  them  for  particular  lines  of  work  and 
induces  them  to  segregate  to  the  end  that  their  own  bodies  and 
thru  their  own  efforts  the  organs,  tissues,  and  all  that  goes  to 
make  up  the  physical  system,  may  be  constructed  and  then 
kept  in  repair  and  in  vigor.  What  is  "that  something"? 

Let  us  begin  our  reply  in  this  fashion :  You  as  a  person- 
ality, as  the  Mr.  Jones,  Miss  Brown,  or  Mrs.  Smith  who  are 
reading  this  treatise,  are  only  a  fraction  of  your  real  self. 

60 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  61 

That  fraction  of  your  consciousness  with  which  you  identify 
yourself,  from  a  mathematical  standpoint,  would  probably  be 
too  small  to  warrant  bother.  A  sentimental  mathematician 
(if  we  could  imagine  a  mathematician  who  worked  according 
to  his  impulses  and  enthusiasms,  according  to  his  likes  and  dis- 
likes) would  impetuously  erase  it.  But  Nature,  or  that  phase 
of  YOURSELF  which  knows  all  Nature's  laws,  is  an  exact 
mathematician.  Nature  is  not  impetuous.  And,  curiously 
enough,  to  you — the  smallest  fraction  in  the  problem  of  indi- 
viduality, She  has  given  you,  the  conscious,  arguing,  doubting, 
cheating,  loving  and  hating,  waking  and  working  YOU,  the 
possibility  of  power  and  mastery  of  the  entire  equation.  She 
has  given  you  the  job  of  being  boss, — the  position  of  com- 
mander. In  precise  psychological  terms,  you  as  the  boss  are 
not  even  a  person;  you  are  the  objective  phase  of  your  mind. 
In  all,  you  are  objective  mind  commanding  yourself,  the  sub- 
conscious mind. 

THE  OBJECTIVE  MIND 

But,  someone  may  question,  I  command  my  subconscious 
mind  to  do  things  for  me,  and  it  does  not  do  them;  how  am  I 
to  account  for  that?  It  is  to  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact  that 
with  very  few  exceptions  we  are  all  as  yet  very  ignorant  com- 
manders. As  a  matter  of  fact,  too  many  people  are  hoping, 
yearning  and  wishing,  and  not  commanding  at  all. 

Fancy  now  a  captain  of  a  steamship.  He  stays  a  good 
deal  in  his  cabin  enjoying  the  pictures  on  the  wall,  rhapsodizing 
about  the  motion  of  the  ship  as  it  glides  over  the  moonlit  waves. 
There  appear  shoals  ahead,  and  the  boat  must  stop.  Of  a 
sudden  the  captain  realizes  that  he  doesn't  know  a  blooming 
thing  about  navigation.  The  next  morning  he  pretends  to 
consult  his  charts,  but  does  not  know  how  to  read  them.  He 
finds  the  ship  is  surrounded  by  rocks.  He  does  not  know  his 
longitude  nor  latitude.  Day  after  day  goes  by.  His  crew 
brews  mutiny.  He  yearns  and  wishes  that  they  remain  loyal 
and  keep  the  ship  in  good  trim.  He  frets  and  he  fumes.  This 
distracts  him  so  much  that  he  forgets  what  port  he  was  bound 
for  when  he  started  out.  He  has  no  goal.  Now  he  com- 
mands this,  and  now  he  commands  the  other  of  his  subordi- 
nates. IT  DOES  NOT  MATTER  WHAT  HE  COMMANDS.  In  a 
situation  like  this  the  REAL  command  overshadowing  the  con- 


62  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

sciousness  of  all  the  subordinates  is  this :  WE  HAVE  NO  CAP- 
TAIN, LET  US  DO  AS  WE  JOLLY  WELL  PLEASE.  And  they  do, 
and  the  "captain"  that  was  "gets  it  in  the  neck." 

The  more  he  had  learned  of  navigation,  and  of  the 
duties  of  his  own  crew,  even  of  the  machinery  contained  in  his 
own  ship,  the  more  of  a  real  commander  would  he  have  been. 
His  crew  did  not  want  to  become  a  disorganized  mob  of  muti- 
neers; the  ignorant  captain  himself  forced  them  into  that  kind 
of  action.  The  more  knowledge  he  had  stowed  away  in  him- 
self regarding  all  that  concerned  his  position,  the  more  could 
he  have  depended  upon  his  commands  being  carried  out  auto- 
matically and  without  friction.  One  must  know  the  thing 
commanded. 

Psychology  is  in  the  business  of  accumulating  and  sup- 
plying that  knowledge.  Psychology  says  that  the  position  of 
the  personality,  or  the  objective  phase  of  mind,  is  analogous 
to  the  position  of  the  captain  of  the  ship,  but  that  the  relation- 
ship is  more  intimate,  because  in  a  sense,  the  entire  "crew" 
that  makes  for  the  success  or  failure  of  the  individual  has  been 
created  by  the  person  in  the  manner  of  reactions  given  to 
experience. 

Psychology  says  that  you,  the  captain,  have  Initiative 
and  that  is  all.  Your  first  assistant  or  "vice-captain"  or  pilot, 
as  it  were,  is  Discrimination, — the  ability  to  form  right  con- 
clusions from  mental  or  physical  experience.  If  you  have  not 
with  you  your  "vice-captain,"  therefore,  you  will  meet  disaster 
during  trie  very  first  emergency.  Encourage  Discrimination  to 
improve  itself  in  every  possible  opportunity.  It  will  recipro- 
cally, then,  enlarge  and  enrich  opportunities  for  the  exercise 
of  your  prime  and  peculiar  quality, — Initiative.  Your  first, 
second  and  third  mates  are  Imagination,  Will  and  Desire. 
They  can  work  wonders  in  securing  compliance,  in  enlisting 
obedient  and  intelligent  effort  from  the  lesser  members  of 
your  crew.  Your  petty  officers  are  your  emotions,  passions,— 
and  like  most  petty  officers,  are  more  or  less  inclined  to  silent 
conflict  one  against  the  other.  Correct  them  by  empowering 
your  "mates"  and  "vice-captain."  And  your  flunkeys  and 
laborers  are  your  habits,  habits,  habits; — all  mentallv  created 
by  yourself — the  act  of  creation  always  some  attitude  or 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  63 

thought  consciously  entertained — the  growth  of  the  habit  not 
seen, — but  subconscious. 

Again,  it  is  as  tho'  .the  mind — objective  and  subconscious, 
resembled  a  factory.  To  derive  a  picture  that  would  instruct 
us  truly,  we  should  probably  have  to  outline  it  about  as 
follows : 

The  executive  or  managing  office  is  the  objective  phase  o* 
mind,  or  that  phase  with  which  you  commonly  identify  you\~ 
self.  Its  functions  are  concerned  with  the  policies,  motives  and 
objects  of  the  concern;  the  executive  does  not  do  the  detail 
work.  Its  functions  are  inclusive  of  such  as  observation,  criti- 
cism, comparison,  analysis,  aggression,  defense — of  all  that 
goes  to  make  up  the  meaning  in  the  word  "Initiative."  The 
duties  of  you,  the  objective  phase,  just  like  the  duties  of  the 
managerial  staff  in  a  commercial  institution,  consist  of  buying 
and  selling.  The  institution  buys  raw  material;  you  as  the 
manager  of  the  institution  of  personality,  do  the  same  thing  as 
"buying"  when  you  ulay  in"  the  raw  material  of  ideas.  Re- 
membering the  law  of  selection,  as  presented  in  a  past  chapter, 
you  can  judge  as  to  the  quality  of  your  current  "selections," 
and  begin  even  now  to  think  over  methods  of  improvement. 
In  both  operations,  mechanical  or  mental,  the  "raw  materials" 
will  be  worked  over  into  things  to  use  and  things  to  sell.  Out 
of  the  entire  operation  that  consists  of  "buying,"  then  "work- 
ing over,"  and  then  of  "selling,"  the  profit  is  gold  with  the 
commercial  institution, — the  profit  is  poise,  wisdom,  and  power 
with  the  institution  of  personality.  Your  personal  influence, 
your  self-expression,  is  what  you  are  selling.  If  your  attitude 
toward  life  is  one  of  repression  or  depression,  your  "sales- 
product"  of  personal  influence  will  not  be  desirable.  The  man- 
ager must  learn  how  to  control  the  actions  of  his  employees,  or 
sabotage  may  be  practiced  on  him. 

Whenever  depressing  and  repressing  captains  of  industry 
get  the  reins  of  commerce  into  their  hands,  we  have  abor- 
tive strikes  and  financial  panics.  Control  does  not  mean  un- 
reasoning "bossing"  and  tyranny.  It  means  acting  in  accord- 
ance with  our  best  thinking  and  understanding,  and  then  not 
being  too  infernally  hide-bound  that  the  present  standard  is 
the  final  and  ultimate  law.  As  we  have  arrived  at  our  present 
status  by  "knocking  out"  old  convictions,  so  can  we  arrive  at 


64  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

still  better  things  by  clutching  and  clinging  to  our  present 
standards  just  a  little  more  loosely.  The  personality  must 
learn  to  employ  only  constructive  emotions  and  attitudes,  and 
treasure  knowledge  of  fact  and  law  above  all  things.  The 
biggest  and  most  successful  manufactories  in  the  world  are 
those  having  well  equipped  legal  (as  well  as  scientific  research) 
departments.  The  attitudes  engendered  or  "born"  in  you 
while  sympathetically  perusing  such  chapters  as  these  are  the 
best  kind  of  "help"  to  take  into  your  employ. 

Now  the  managers  of  commercial  institutions  must  know 
their  raw  material,  must  know  their  machinery,  must  know 
their  superintendents  and  laborers.  They  must  consult  their 
own  likes  and  dislikes  less  and  less,  otherwise  they  never  will 
be  able  to  judge  values  accurately.  To  know  their  raw  mate- 
rial means  that  they  have  trained  their  observation,  discrimi- 
nation, and  are  not  easily  beguiled  by  flattery.  They  must 
scout  around,  which  serves  two  purposes;  the  first  is  that  it 
saves  them  from  being  immersed  to.o  long  in  their  own  pre- 
delictions  about  things,  and  the  second  is  that  by  scouting 
around  they  can  check  up  their  ideas  of  excellence  in  raw 
material  and  finished  products  by  observing  what  others  are 
handling  in  both  departments  of  similar  industries.  Thus,  if 
we  stretch  the  word  "observation"  to  include  much  more  than 
given  it  in  a  careless  acceptance, — it  is  thru  observation  they 
have  learned  values.  They  must  know  their  machinery;  then 
in  event  a  reasonable  improvement  suggests  itself,  they  will  not 
be  so  sentimentally  attached  to  the  old  ones.  They  must  know 
their  superintendents  and  laborers,  in  order  to  imbue  these 
subordinates  with  a  loyal  will  to  exert  themselves  for  "the 
good  of  the  house."  The  more  and  better  an  executive  does 
all  these  things,  the  better  and  more  are  the  products  of  his 
factory. 

Your  duties  or  functions,  objectively  (as  a  "personality") 
are  just  like  that.  Your  observations  must  carry  the  faculty 
of  an  ever-improving  discrimination  right  with  it,  so  that  your 
tendency  to  exaggerate  or  to  minimize  events  and  ideas  will 
grow  less.  If  you  exaggerate,  you  pay  too  much  for  your 
"raw"  material.  If  you  minimize,  you  cheat  yourself, — for 
someone  else  will  take  the  idea  for  what  it  is  worth,  and  make 
a  profit  out  of  it.  Like  with  the  executives  of  a  manufacturing 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  65 

plant,  you  are  to  exercise  initiative ;  you  must  scout  around  as 
they  do,  to  get  away  from  your  habit  of  viewing  things  thru 
the  spectacles  of  your  own  likes  and  dislikes,  to  compete  ably, 
and  to  profit  by  comparisons  of  ideas  held  by  associates  and 
competitors.  For  we  are  all  in  the  business  of  living.  With 
this  brief  survey,  we  will  leave  the  objective,  or  waking  per- 
sonality phase  of  mind,  to  return  for  a  review,  it  may  be,  later. 

THE  SUBCONSCIOUS 

Now  we  come  to  the  factory  proper.  We  have  left  the 
objective  phase  of  mind,  or  the  executive  offices.  We  are  on 
the  "subconscious"  side  of  the  partition.  It  covers  infinitely 
more  space — but  like  in  any  factory  the  atmosphere  outside 
of  the  managing  office  is  DEDUCTIVE,  whereas  the  atmosphere 
in  the  executive  office  of  the  successful  factory  is  redolent 
always  of  INITIATIVE,  and  of  the  INDUCTIVE  processes  of  mind. 
Now,  then,  in  the  deductive  or  subconscious  vistas,  we  will 
fancy  that  there  stretches  before  us  a  panorama  of  machinery, 
of  workers, — the  atmosphere  itself  vibrant  with  activity.  But 
there  is  always  and  at  all  times  a  waiting  attitude  about  those 
workers,  superintendents  they  may  be,  whose  working  stations 
in  the  subconscious  phase  of  this  factory  are  nearest  the  execu- 
tive office.  They  are  nearest  the  boss,  and  the  secret  of  their 
expectant  or  waiting  attitude  is  not  difficult  to  fathom.  They 
are  awaiting  always  to  hear  the  wishes,  the  new  orders,  from 
the  "boss."  The  boss  is  you.  We  may  at  times  have  to 
stretch  the  imagination  ever  so  little  to  learn  from  this  picture, 
but  that,  too,  is  the  best  kind  of  mental  exercise.  Look  well, 
and  in  the  interest  of  becoming  a  more  able  executive,  learn 
about  the  working  force  of  your  "factory." 

First  as  to  machinery;  you  have  two  main  divisions,  as 
already  seen — the  physical  cells,  tissues,  nerves,  organs — con- 
stitute one  of  these  main  divisions; — the  psychic,  or  the  pas- 
sions, feeling  and  emotions  are  the  second,  and  by  far  the  most 
important  division. 

The  psychic  machinery  is  the  most  important  because  the 
physical  is  merely  its  outward  "ex-/>r^J5-ion," — that  is  to  say, 
what  has  been  out-pressed. 

The  important  machinery  is  made  up  of  your  fundamental 
attitudes  toward  life;  of  your  deepest  convictions.  It  is  psychic 
machinery.  It  is  not  visible. 


66  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

The  dynamos  or  sources  of  power  for  that  machinery  are 
your  strong  passions  plus  the  constant  currents  of  emotion  and 
feeling. 

The  directing  lever  is  the  Will. . 

A  capable  manager  discards  an  inadequate  machine,  with- 
out sentiment,  and  replaces  it  with  a  new  one. 

It  may  be  more  difficult,  but  it  is  a  necessary  psychological 
achievement  so  to  discard  and  replace  old  or  inadequate  con- 
viction-attitudes toward  life.  Only  rarely  progressive  persons 
really  care  to  do  what  the  wise  manager  does.  The  person 
usually  wants  to  hug  his  conviction  to  himself  forever.  He 
grows  sentimental  about  it,  tho'  it  may  be  spoiling,  not  only  his 
mental  efficiency,  but  his  health  as  well. 

A  deep  conviction,  a  tightly  held  mental  concept,  an  atti- 
tude toward  life, — these  are  just  as  much  machines  as  is  a 
lathe  or  a  loom.  They  will  work  out  the  raw  material  of 
ideas  according  to  the  innate  pattern  of  the  conviction  or  atti- 
tude. When  the  replacement  of  a  self-limiting  conviction  is 
heroically  done,  then  the  dynamos  of  passion,  emotion  and 
feeling,  of  thought,  and  even  the  directing  lever  of  Will,  all 
work  more  smoothly  and  effectively. 

The  old  "common  laborers"  presiding  over  this  machin- 
ery are  your  mental  habits,  more  mental  habits, — thousands  of 
mental  habits. 

The  new  laborers,  continually  trooping  in,  are  your 
thoughts,  thoughts,  and  more  thoughts. 

The  Habits  are  the  old  employees,  always  teaching  the 
thoughts,  which  are  the  more  recent  ones,  how  to  work. 

It  must  be  a  strong  thought  to  resist  the  influence  of 
merely  adding  to  the  volume  of  your  habits.  Thinking  "after 
a  fashion"  has  no  chance.  It  will  succumb  to  the  tuition  of  the 
"old-timer" — who  is  already  a  habit,  and  in  a  short  time  will 
be  but  another  habit  or  reinforcement  to  an  old  one. 

Mental  habits  are  much  more  numerous,  subtle  and  pow- 
erful than  those  physically  observable.  Well  has  the  auto- 
matic or  subconscious  mind  been  termed  a  "synthesis  of 
habits." 

So  far,  this  has  been  but  a  view  of  the  "floor  plan"  of  the 
conscious  and  subconscious  phases  of  mind.  '  What  all  resides 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  67 

in  the  subconscious  part  of  the  factory  no  sane  investigator  yet 
dares  say  in  full. 

KNOWLEDGE 

We  do  know  that  it  is  a  living — joyfully  feeling,  and 
painfully  suffering  REGISTRY  of  all  youj  experiences  and  your 
thoughts  regarding  them.  We  do  know  that  it  is  "self-aware" 
in  that  sense,  of  such  bad  suggestions  as  are  at  the  bottom  of 
outward  hysteria,  incapacity,  and  often  of  physical  disease. 
Esculapius  and  Hippocrates  proved  that  anciently ;  Freud 
is  proving  it  again, — modernly. 

SUSPICION 

We  suspect  it  has  direct  connection  with  a  real  tho'  in- 
visible plane  of  sub-human,  extra-normal,  and  at  times  even 
super-normal  intelligence,  energy  and  power.  Ennemoser 
enumerates  scores  of  attested  cases  wherein  the  physical  bodies 
of  recluses,  hysteriacs,  monks,  nuns,  etc.,  were  floated  thru  the 
air,  often  in  the  direction  willed  by  the  person  so  in  the  grip 
of  his  "subconscious."  The  literature  of  psychical  research 
teems  with  instances  describing  unaccountable  manifestations 
of  just  as  startling  a  nature.  Some  students  go  so  far  as  to 
speculate  that  the  Stonehenge  monoliths  and  the  Egyptian 
pyramids  were  erected  under  the  supervision  of  people  who 
knew  how  to  direct  such  occult  powers ;  that  the  transportation 
and  placement  of  these  gigantic  blocks  of  stone  was  not  accom- 
plished by  purely  physical  means. 

INVESTIGATION 

In  the  main,  up  to  this  time,  it  is  thru  hypnotism,  or  thru 
so-called  trance,  ensuing  upon  temporary  paralysis  of  the  ob- 
jective functions,  that  systematic  research  and  collection  of 
data  has  been  possible.  This  has  been  especially  true  of  the 
more  startling  phenomena,  such  as  levitation,  clairvoyance, 
prophecy,  quick  and  lucid  diagnosis  of  obscure  maladies,  often 
with  prescriptions,  the  applications  of  which  result  in  almost 
"miraculous"  cures,  etc. 

But  the  desirability  of  hypnotism  is  much  in  question. 
Danger,  some  comprehended,  some  not  yet  understood,  seems 
to  accompany  the  practice.  Personally,  I  cannot  see  why  an 
intelligent  person,  who  has  studiously  acquired  all  the  infor- 
mation available  on  the  subject,  should  not  practice  hypnotism 


68  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

— if  for  no  other  purpose  than  to  add  more  illumination  to 
that  conjectural  field.  If  there  are  unknown  dangers,  the 
sooner  we  know  them  the  better.  We  cannot  remove  a  danger 
until  we  know  what  it  is. 

The  fact  is  that  whether  we  believe  or  disbelieve,  we  arc 
nevertheless  practicing  hypnotism  upon  ourselves  and  upon 
others,  unconsciously.  For  instance,  a  person  who  enforces 
upon  you  a  dogma  that  hypnotism  is  of  the  devil,  has  prac- 
ticed hypnotism  upon  you.  The  perfection  of  his  experiment 
is  determined  by  the  amount  of  rigor  you  manifest  in  later 
avoiding  the  topic. 

Hypnotism,  thinned  out,  to  be  sure,  but  still  hypnotism, 
is  so  universal  and  penetrating  inherency  of  mental  action,  that 
no  more  ridiculous  thing  has  ever  been  perpetrated  than  to 
pass  laws  against  it.  We  might  as  well  pass  laws  against 
seeing  grass  as  green;  we  might  as  well  try  to  divorce  the 
alphabet  from  written  language. 

Ignorance,  of  course,  is  penalized  throughout  Nature. 
The  ignoramus  who  practices  or  submits  to  a  deliberated  and 
specific  act  of  hypnotism  may  be  doing  no  more  than  to  accel- 
erate the  infliction  upon  himself  of  the  penalties  of  ignorance. 
Those  consequences  of  ignorance  otherwise  could  have  come 
upon  him  "thinned  out," — and  he  might  normally  stand  them, 
better. 

It  might  be  but  a  weird  and  insane  speculation  to  guess 
that  the  intelligent  man  would  probably  accelerate  the  rewards 
of  his  intelligence  in  the  same  way.  Before  Freud  perfected 
his  later  and  valuable  theories  in  regard  to  the  psychology  of 
sex,  he  had  much  experience  in  the  French  hospitals  where 
hypnotism  is  deliberately  and  systematically  used. 

If  your  intelligence,  courage  and  aspiration  are  genuine, 
I  do  not  believe  that  hypnotism  could  mar  you.  If  you  are 
selfish  and  rabbit-hearted,  undoubtedly  it  would  in  some  sense 
kill  you.  At  least  I  hope  it  would.  I  do  not  know  but  that  it 
might  be  a  good  test  for  many  to  find  out  once  and  for  all  if 
the  intelligence  and  other  high  qualities  of  which  they  are  so 
proud  are  real,  or  merely  mislabeled  conceit,  prejudice  or 
conviction. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  69 

ANOTHER  THING  ABOUT  THE  "FACTORY" 

It  has  been  proven  that  telepathy  is  a  function  of  the  sub- 
conscious mind,  tho'  it  may  not  be  readily  and  cheaply  avail- 
able to  prejudiced  investigators.  The  existence  of  this  faculty 
can  teach  us  one  thing;  we  harm  ourselves  if  we  do  not  con- 
sider it.  It  is  this:  To  receive  messages  sent  mentally  by  an- 
other human  being  is  no  more  wonderful  than  the  constant 
telepathic  interchange  going  on  in  one's  own  psychic  and  phys- 
ical constitution.  We  must  not  forget  that  the  executive  in  the 
office  of  personality  is  (or  rather,  you  are)  subject  to  the  play 
of  telepathic  and  even  hypnotic  influence  of  the  laborers  in  the 
deeper  recesses  of  the  "factory,"  who  strive  and  yearn  to  have 
the  executive  conform  more  to  their  collective  atmosphere  of 
established  habit.  They  wish  to  empower  themselves- — to 
make  it  easier  for  themselves,  always.  All  this  must  be  intelli- 
gently resisted  by  a  counterplay  of  telepathic  or  mesmeric  will 
upon  them  from  your  station  in  the  directing  office, — with  a 
comprehensive  but  firm  and  persistent  assertion  of  your  ideals 
and  purposes.  The  manager  of  a  good  institution  contrives 
in  a  thousand  ways  to  bring  to  the  minds  of  all  employees  his 
insistence  that  in  every  way  possible  they  conform  to  the  main 
policies  of  his  plant. 

ANOTHER  VIEW  OF  "VITAL  ENERGY" 

In  tests  conducted  by  expert  investigators,  it  has  been 
determined  that  to  a  person  in  the  subconscious  state  of  mind, 
the  vital  energy  and  other  principles  of  the  human  constitution 
become  visible  as  an  aura,  which  appears  as  a  somewhat  lumi- 
nous, oval  cloud  about  the  physical  body.  It  is  claimed  by  such 
clairvoyants  that  persons  in  good  health  and  with  tranquil 
minds  possess  auras  that  are  clear,  and  that  with  persons  who 
have  acquired  a  high  degree  of  knowledge  or  of  physic  power, 
the  aura  is  not  only  clear,  but  brilliantly  luminous.  It  is  also 
claimed  that  the  play  of  the  person's  emotions,  thoughts  and 
feelings  can  be  seen  as  great  flashes  of  color,  bright,  stimulat- 
ing and  attractive,  or,  on  the  other  hand,  livid,  depressive,  and 
repulsive, — according  to  the  character  of  the  feelings  or 
thoughts. 

To  prove  that  this  aura  is  not  an  hallucination,  Emile 
Boirac,  a  French  investigator,  and  others,  show  that  it 
can  be  injured  in  certain  non-physical  ways,  and  that  subse- 


70  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

quently  the  injury  will  appear  "miraculously"  upon  the  corre- 
sponding portion  of  the  physical  body. 

Mediums,  so-called,  have  often  furnished  good  material 
for  such  investigations,  tho'  with  few  exceptions,  they  as  well 
as  their  "guides"  seem  to  lack  sufficient  sense  to  give  a  rational 
or  even  coherent  explanation  of  the  phenomena. 

A  great  deal  has  been  written  on  the  subject  of  auras  by 
men  and  women  whose  plain  desire  it  is  that  students  should 
infer  they  (the  writers)  are  "Masters"  or  "Adepts."  Briefly, 
it  is  their  students'  belief  that  Adepts,  Masters,  and  "great 
souls"  exist,  who  have  already  acquired  all  knowledge  in  re- 
gard to  human  evolution ;  that  they  have  already  applied  all 
such  knowledge,  and  are  therefore  far  in  advance  even  of  our 
greatest  scientists.  The  beliefs  of  such  students  are  stimulat- 
ing, but  should  be  classed  as  beliefs.  If  not  entirely  foolish, 
such  students  would  readily  see  they  can  never  verify  the  ex- 
istence of  a  "Master,"  unless  they  themselves  already  were 
masters — which  brings  them  back  to  the  point  from  which  they 
started. 

It  is  wise  always  to  distinguish  between  belief  and  knowl- 
edge. It  is  good  to  have  a  belief  and  a  faith;  but  it  is  also 
gopd  to  refrain  from  calling  that  possession  "knowledge, "- 
as  it  is  good  to  refrain  from  all  lies.  In  a  treatise  on  psychol- 
ogy, it  is  to  be  expected  that  whenever  belief  is  mistaken  for 
investigation  and  knowledge  of  fact,  there  the  mistake  will  be 
pointed  out. 

APPLICATION 

Telepathy,  clairvoyance  and  clairaudience,  of  course,  are 
not  limited  to  investigating  other  people's  auras.  Telepathy, 
clairvoyance,  etc.,  quite  likely  are  the  inner  senses,  which  in 
this  stage  of  human  progress,  and  probably  for  the  next  mil- 
lion years  or  so,  are  to  go  thru  the  process  of  being  awakened. 
We  spoke  of  the  only  dogma  that  psychology  cares  to  enforce : 
that  Man  is  a  psychic  being  inhabiting  a  physical  machine. 

It  is  important  if  the  vital  body  or  aura  can  be  damaged 
by  others,  especially  if  that  damage  later  reproduces  itself  in 
or  on  the  physical  body.  But  it  becomes  infinitely  more  im- 
portant, then,  that  by  my  attitudes  and  moods  I  myself  impair 
or  distress  that  vital  body.  I  begin  then  to  realize  that  it  is 
the  connecting  link  between  myself — the  power  of  perception 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  71 

and  initiative, — and  my  "expression"  or  physical  machine.  I 
begin  to  comprehend,  then,  that  if  I  can  impair  the  vital  body 
and  later  experience  the  impairment  physically,  then  I  can  also 
vitalize  it,  strengthen  it,  make  it  more  brilliant,  and  likewise 
get  the  beneficent  physical  reactions.  If  I  am  mystically  in- 
clined, I  begin  to  view  that  aura  as  an  indication  of  a  body 
much  more  "real"  and  eternal,  than  this  other  function,  the 
"out-pressed"  physical  body. 

Dr.  Crawford  is  proving  that  the  matter  of  the  vital 
body,  manipulated  to  resemble  a  rope  or  semi-rigid  water 
hose,  is  the  invisible  instrument  used  in  instances  of  telekinesis 
or  levitation  of  heavy  objects  apparently  without  "physical" 
contact.  A  curious  instance  occurs  to  mind  as  I  write,  and  I 
hope  it  may  have  some  bearing  as  a  citation.  A  young  lady, 
and  I  understand  in  a  remote  way  related  to  me,  on  a  rainy 
Autumn  evening  some  years  ago  found  herself  alone  in  the 
kitchen  possessed  with  a  raging  tooth-ache  combined  with  neu- 
ralgia. She  had  been  helping  the  cook  put  up  preserves,  an 
innocent  and  noble  occupation,  by  the  way, — and  near  her 
stood  one  of  those  tall,  two-bushel  baskets  common  in  our 
Eastern  states.  In  the  bottom  of  the  basket  there  remained  a 
layer  of  rather  large  tomatoes.  The  cook,  and  it  seems  also 
the  other  members  of  the  household,  had  all  gone  out  for  the 
evening.  The  neuralgic  attack  came  on  severely  and  suddenly; 
to  compose  herself  the  girl  sat  down  on  a  corner  of  the  table. 
She  held  her  hands  to  her  face  as  one  sometimes  does  in  pain. 
Automatically  she  was  staring  into  the  tall  basket,  as  she  now 
thinks  of  it,  but  at  the  time  probably  did  not  know  at  what  she 
was  staring.  Just  at  the  instant  when  the  neuralgia  gave  her 
an  exceptionally  diabolical  throb,  one  of  the  biggest  and 
heaviest  of  the  tomatoes  jumped  fully  four  feet  into  the  air 
toward  her  face,  did  not  quite  reach  her,  and  then  fell  on  the 
floor  and  rolled  to  the  other  end  of  the  kitchen.  I  am  not  sure 
that  the  incident  is  correctly  reported  in  detail;  but  I  am  as  sure 
that  essentially  it  is  the  statement  of  a  fact  as  I  am  that  the 
girl  in  question  does  not  lie.  She  is  a  whole-souled  and  rather 
retiring  woman  today,  with  a  family  of  her  own,  and  no  in- 
terest whatever  in  cults  or  isms  that  make  specialties  of  the 
weird.  What  puzzles  her  is  that  altho'  the  neuralgia  had  been 
attacking  her  off  and  on  all  that  Fall,  after  that  tomato 


72  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

jumped,  she  did  not  have  any  neuralgia — not  from  that  instant 
to  the  present  day.  Yet  if  the  mediums  under  investigation 
by  Crawford  produce  f">r  odies  "ropes"  that  can 

be  detected  by  the  crudest  clairvoyance  and  even  by  physical 
tests,  then  I  cannot  see  why  the  unusual  pain  may  not  have 
made  the  girl  mediumistic  for  a  second,  with  just  that  kind  of 
rnediumship.  In  other  words,  the  subconscious  did  a  little 
telekinesis  and  self-healing  in  one  and  the  same  instant. 

A  GENERALIZATION 

The  building  of  the  embodiments,  psychic  and  physical, 
is  a  function  of  the  subconscious  mind.  The  character  of  the 
embodiments  is  determined  by  the  predominating  impressions 
contained  in  the  subconscious  mind. 

This  is  but  one  function  or  power  of  the  subconscious 
among  many  others. 

There  are  many  ways  in  which  intuitively  we  prove  our 
faith  in  the  resources  of  the  subconscious, — tho'  objectively 
we  may  refuse  to  acknowledge  it.  Among  these  many  ways, 
there  is,  for  instance,  the  practice  widespread  as  the  human 
race  itself,  harmless  and  often  successful,  of  "sleeping  over" 
a  problem.  The  occasional  successful  results  serve  to  show 
that  in  the  archives  of  that  "factory"  of  the  subconscious, 
there  are  accumulations  of  information  not  ordinarily  avail-, 
able  in  the  objective  state.  Inspirations  of  poetry,  music,  art, 
philosophy,  no  less  than  occasional  solutions  of  technical  prob- 
lems, are  on  record  as  having  been  received  in  that  way.  We 
have  the  testimony  of  Coleridge  insofar  as  poetry  is  concerned. 
Beethoven  has  the  same  to  say  with  regard  to  the  method  by 
which  his  genius  instructed  him.  Socrates  seems  to  have  been 
so  sensitive  that  the  voice  or  instruction  of  his  genius  or 
"daemon"  (apparently  a  "personification"  of  his  segregated 
best  subconscious  accumulations) — according  to  his  own  testi- 
mony, was  not  lost  to  him  even  in  the  more  active  hours  of  the 
day. 

SELF-DIAGNOSIS 

This  searchlight  ability  of  the  subconscious  can  be  di- 
rected. The  historical  founders  of  medicine,  namely,  Hip- 
pocrates and  Esculapius,  had  their  patients  sleep  at  the  foot  of 
some  statue  representing  the  patient's  own  favorite  divinity. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

They  directed  that  searchlight  cognizance  back  upon  the  con- 
dition of  the  patient  himself.  The  temple  atmosphere,  and 
the  sacerdotal  features  were  all  calculated  to  enlist  the  faith 
of  the  sick  ones,-  and  thereby  impress  the  subconscious  mind. 
It  was  during  sleep  that  priests  who  were  versed  in  what  mis- 
takenly we  fancy  to  be  a  strictly  modern  practice  (namely,  . 
hypnotism)  would  induce  in  the  sleeper  the  somnambulistic 
or  "lucid"  state.  The  subconscious  thus  induced  to  explore 
its  own  recesses,  the  patient  would  murmur  to  the  attendant 
not  only  a  diagnosis  of  his  ailment  (probably  a  la  psychoan- 
alysis), but  often  would  add  to  that  information  a  prescrip- 
tion intended  to  cure  it — or  a  prognosis  of  the  malady  that 
invariably  "worked  out." 

I  was  speaking  only  a  few  days  ago  to  a  prospector.  He 
has  no  education.  He  has  by  no  means  the  wide,  cheap  view 
and  the  tiny  faith  that  often  goes  with  literary  folks,  and  with 
folks  who  shop  around  among  all  the  cults  and  isms  for  what 
they  can  "get"  out  of  them.  He  had  read  one  rather  authentic 
book  on  the  power  of  the  mind,  and  it  had  taken  him  six 
months  to  do  it.  He  assumed  in  his  naive  way  that  if  it  took 
him  that  long  to  read  it,  naturally  it  must  have  taken  the 
learned  man  who  wrote  it  many  arduous  years  at  hard  labor. 
Then  if  it  took  that  long,  it  surely  must  be  true,  and  he  would 
apply  it.  One  of  his  legs  troubled  him,  both  with  rheu- 
matism and  with  varicose  veins.  He  concentrated  from  noon 
until  it  was  time  to  retire,  that  during  the  night,  subconsciously, 
he  would  remove  the  ailment  from  that  leg.  What  was  his  ^ 
surprise  to  note  that  as  soon  as  he  laid  his  head  on  the  pillow, 
he  could  not  open  his  eyes,  and  yet  he  had  done  less  work  that 
day  than  on  any  previous  day  which  he  could  remember.  At 
any  rate,  falling  asleep,  he  dreamed  that  a  doctor  came  into 
the  cabin.  He  ordered  the  prospector  to  bring  him  a  basin  of 
water.  Then  he  opened  his  valise,  took  out  some  surgical 
tools, — did  a  few  things  to  the  body  (note:  it  is  the  prospec- 
tor's own  body  which  he  is  viewing  in  the  dream),  worked  on 
the  offending  leg  some  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes,  bandaged  it 
and  departed.  The  prospector  woke  up  in  the  morning  with  a 
vivid  recollection  of  the  dream.  He  jumped  out  of  bed.  The 
rheumatism  was  gone.  He  looked  for  the  bandages,  and  there 
were  none.  He  felt  for  the  varicose  veins;  they  were  still 


74  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

somewhat  bunched,  but  not  so  badly  as  on  the  preceding  day. 
But  his  joy  at  the  departure  of  the  rheumatism  was  so  great, 
so  filled  his  mind  that  he  forgot  all  about  the  veins.  Six 
weeks  after  the  occurrence  he  went  to  be  examined  by  a  physi- 
cian, merely  to  satisfy  me.  Of  varicose  veins — the  physician's 
report  had  it,  "No  trace." 

Some  people  are  unable  to  understand  why  others  should 
have  predominant  mental  impressions  different  from  their  own. 
Some  would  say  that  because  this  miner  in  his  dream  visualized 
a  physician  who  used  material  means,  he  was,  so  to  say,  "on 
the  wrong  track;"  that  he  should  have  been  more  spiritual.  I 
may  be  a  poor  hand  at  metaphysics,  but  yet  it  is  my  opinion 
that  a  spiritual  power  has  never  yet  been  invoked  for  physical 
ends,  and  never  will  be.  The  power  used  is  a  rather  strong 
psychic  effluvium,  quite  physical  in  many  of  its  characteristics, 
tho'  invisible.  But  to  our  dreams  or  trance  perceptions,  this 
effluvium  in  action  dramatizes  according  to  our  deepest  con- 
victions about  healing.  The  good  ignorant  Christian,  under 
the  same  circumstances,  undoubtedly  would  "see  Jesus,"  or 
the  virgin  Mary,  ministering  in  the  same  goodly  office;  the 
Christian  Scientist  would  see  Mary  Baker  Eddy,  the  Theo- 
sophist  might  be  honored  by  a  visit  from  Madame  Blavatsky ; 
and  if  we  could  fancy  some  backwoods  farmer's  wife  with  a 
sublime  and  unsullied  faith  in  patent  medicine  advertisements, 
then  the  healing  of  that  kind  of  dear  lady  might  dramatize  in 
her  dream  a  visit  from  Lydia  E.  Pinkham.  When  we  quote 
the  "according  to  your  faith"  passage  from  the  bible,  let  us 
look  carefully  into  the  word  "according."  It  is  a  hint,  which, 
when  amplified,  explains  more  of  subconscious  law  than  we  can 
ever  rationally  hope  to  put  between  the  covers  of  an 
encyclopaedia. 

There  are  many  things  not  yet  understood  even  about  the 
symptoms  and  faint  indications  of  man's  complete  nature.  All 
that  we  have  seen  so  far,  currently  as  well  as  throughout  the 
pages  of  recorded  history,  are  but  traces  and  hints.  Psychol- 
ogy does  but  humbly  attempt  to  rationalize  and  put  into  a 
helpful  system  the  results  of  glimpses  so  far  gained  to  the  end 
that  they  may  not  be  crassly  forgotten.  It  is  a  mistake,  con- 
sidering the  fact  that  our  knowledge  is  incomplete,  to  dog- 
matize and  to  label, — for  instance,  in  a  case  such  as  that  of 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  75 

Joan  of  Arc.  Here  is  a  simple,  untutored,  unlettered,  inex- 
perienced country  girl.  She  conducts  an  effective  and  complex 
military  activity.  She  confounds  the  opposition  of  a  soldiery 
who  are  led  by  tacticians  and  generals  efficiently  equipped  with 
the  knowledge  of  warfare  which  obviously  she  lacks.  She 
makes  no  mistakes  save  when  accepting  the  advice  of  some 
friendly  general,  marshal  or  other  war  expert.  Later  she  is 
confronted  by  the  crafty  beasts  who  are  to  murder  her.  To 
make  that  action  safer  for  themselves,  from  her  own  replies 
in  that  "court,"  they  strive  to  find  material  with  which  to  rouse 
antagonisms  among  her  pious  admirers.  The  latter  at  the 
time  are  split  in  allegiance  between  two  claimants  of  the 
papacy,  both  sides  vociferating  that  there  is  only  one.  It  is  a 
grand  opportunity  to  have  Joan  entrap  herself  by  replying  to 
an  apparently  guileless  question  as  to  which  pope  she  prefers. 
And  into  the  teeth  of  her  abysmal  torturers  she  hurls  the  his- 
toric counter  question,  mildly  spoken:  "Are  there  then  two 
popes?"-— by  which  she  places  her  inquisitors  in  precisely  the 
position  they  had  wished  her  to  occupy.  Whence  came  this 
wisdom,  this  ability?  What  do  the  resources  of  the  subcon- 
scious mind  not  encompass?  If  she  was  the  tool  of  angels,  or 
of  occult  adepts,  or  of  the  spirits  who  had  once  been  incarnate 
as  statesmen  or  rulers  of  France,  can  the  mind  of  any  person 
be  shaped  into  the  same  sort  of  instrument?  If  so,  what  are 
the  conditions?  Was  she  herself  perchance  the  reincarnation 
of  some  former  warrior?  Here  is  a  well-attested  "miracle," 
covering  not  moments,  but  many  months,  in  consummation.  It 
was  not  a  momentary  occurrence,  leaving  observers  confused 
as  to  what  really  did  happen.  It  is  a  good  axiom  that  can  be 
turned  and  applied  both  ways.  So  if  it  is  true  that  things 
happen  because  we  thought  them  into  happening,  so  also  is  it 
true  that  things  happen  in  order  that  we  should  think  about 
them.  To  canonize  Joan  is  not  doing  that.  It  may  be  a  good 
thing  to  sanctify  her,  but  that  in  no  wise  tells  us  the  how  and 
why  of  the  mystery  surrounding  her  life  and  actions.  It  is  a 
good  thing  to  bake  a  cake;  but  if  I  want  to  find  the  location  of 
Chicago  on  a  map,  no  matter  how  many  cakes  I  bake,  I  will 
not  find  Chicago.  I'll  have  to  look  at  a  map. 

Now  we  are  not  in  the  position  of  having  "invented" 
psychology,   or  of  having  been   inspired  with  the   "ultimate 


76  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

truth"  in  regard  to  it.  Psychology  is  the  only  map  at  which 
we  may  look  to  find  things  as  they  are,  but,  frankly,  the  con- 
sensus of  knowledge  of  pschology  so  far  accumulated  is  far 
from  complete.  We  have,  as  already  said,  but  traces,  indica- 
tions and  hints.  But  they  are  unmistakable  traces  and  hints. 
Wherever  we  find  enforced  dogma  of  revealed  and  "ultimate" 
truths,  there,  curious  as  it  may  seem,  we  may  look  for  an 
abortion  of  man's  evolutionary  endeavors.  Why?  Because 
in  the  racial  sense  dogmas  serve  the  same  way  with  the  com- 
munity subconscious  mind  that  the  personal  deep  convictions 
and  attitudes  toward  life  serve  the  individual.  That  at  least 
is  a  law  worthy  of  incorporation  in  the  psychological  hand- 
book. Then  and  thereafter,  the  application  of  the  other  things 
recommended  as  helpful  will  not  be  twisted  from  their  purpose 
by  an  underlying  and  unrecognized  danger. 

On  the  basis  of  accumulated  facts,  it  is  the  conclusion  of 
psychology  that  within  the  precincts  of  that  subconscious  mind 
of  yours  there  exist  detailed,  complete  knowledge,  genius  and 
power.  Metaphysics  would  say  it  is  your  apportionment,  as 
seen  in  foregoing  illustrations,  of  universal  intelligence  and 
power, — of  omniscience  and  omnipotence,  if  you  will.  And  it 
is  subordinate  to  you.  It  obeys  every  command  of  yours  to 
the  extent  that  your  commands  are  reinforced  by  the  deepest 
convictions  of  your  character.  It  obeys  still  more  promptly 
and  effectively  when  such  commands  are  "in  tune"  with  its 
laws.  Its  laws,  because  it  is  an  apportionment  of  universal 
mind,  are  universal  laws,  not  the  personal  laws  of  your  likes 
and  dislikes;  nor  are  they  the  laws  of  your  convictions,  even  if 
you  should  have  made  a  religion  out  of  your  convictions.  The 
first  feature  in  the  understanding  of  that  universal  law  is  now 
covered.  How  many  saw  it?  It  is  this:  Objective  action  is 
Initiative;  Subconscious  or  Subjective  action  is  Deductive. 

Ability,  from  the  meanest  to  superlative,  is  subconscious. 
The  expert  linotyper  sets  the  printed  words  you  are  reading 
now,  mostly  thru  "force  of  habit;"  his  initiative  or  will  are 
little  concerned  in  the  process,  or  not  at  all.  You  will  to  walk 
to  town,  or  across  the  room,  and  again,  your  habit  walks  or 
transports  you  there.  It  may  be  that  at  some  time  you,  as 
mere  "power  to  perceive,"  desired  embodiment,  as  now  you 
desire  to  cross  the  room, — and  were  embodied  because  the 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  77 

subconscious  took  your  desire  then  as  a  command  to  embody 
as  now  it  takes  your  command  to  walk.  It  may  be  that  always 
that  "power  to  perceive,"  which  is  the  most  essential  you,  has 
been  embodied,  in  psychic  or  spiritual  bodies,  or  even  in  phys- 
ical ones,  and  that  the  progressive  embodiments  represent  no 
more  than  a  re-awakening  of  the  subconscious  "habit"  to 
embody, — always  in  line  with  the  essence  of  former  convic- 
tions, unexpended  ambitions  and  desires.  Once  in  a  while  one 
finds  a  child  who  has  more  than  the  usual  power  of  memory.  I 
have  asked  three  or  four  such  tots  how  they  felt  when  first 
learning  to  walk.  One  described  it  as  rather  a  fearful  new 
adventure.  The  others  believed  they  had  always  walked,  but 
somehow  had  forgotten,  and  were  now  re-learning.  I've  con- 
versed with  a  musical  genius,  who  said  that  altho'  he  was  not 
brought  into  touch  with  music  until  his  15th  year,  yet  unmis- 
takably he  knew  he  was  resuming  something  he'd  previously 
acquired  thru  study,  drill,  and  sacrifice  of  other  pleasures. 
Many  people  feel  the  same  way  when  suddenly  confronted  with 
this  very  line  of  thought,  tho'  for  the  former  section  of  the 
current  "life"  they  had  never  heard  of  it. 

It  would  seem  that  every  detail  of  the  various  pinnacles 
of  human  perfectability  are  already  resident  in  the  subcon- 
scious mind.  The  ability  to  tap  cosmic  sources  of  intelligence 
and  knowledge  actually  seems  to  reside  there.  It  builds  the 
body  in  the  first  place,  then  maintains  it  to  the  extent  that  you 
do  not  throttle  its  activity  with  home-brewed  faiths,  dogmas, 
convictions  and  selfish  emotions.  It  seems  that  the  things  so 
far  discussed,  such  as  health,  buoyancy,  the  ability  to  succeed 
financially  or  socially,  are  but  the  kindergarten  toys  in  the  less 
important  storerooms  and  workrooms  of  that  "subconscious" 
factory.  Yet  at  our  present  stage  of  evolution  health  and  suc- 
cess are  important.  We  cannot  do  our  work,  we  cannot  claim 
we  are  doing  our  best,  if  we  have  not  enlisted  subconscious 
cooperation  to  the  extent  of  decent  physical  maintenance. 
Health  and  Success  are  legitimate  standards  at  the  present 
time;  we  must  learn  to  master  them;  we  work  and  live  to  a 
great  extent  for  them  and  with  them.  When  we  have  mas- 
tered them,  we  will  see  them  to  have  been  minor  considerations 
after  all.  We  will  see,  then,  that  by  mastery  of  them  thru  expe- 
rience in  them,  we  but  intended  to  teach  ourselves  a  capacity 


78  PSYCHOLOGY—  PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

for  issues,  powers  (now  occult)  and  activities  that  now  are 
undreamed  —  that  now  would  seem  superhuman.  But  we  can- 
not expect  to  solve  problems  in  higher  mathematics  while  we 
still  cut  each  other's  throats,  or  destroy  each  other's  characters 
while  disagreeing  that  two  and  two  make  four.  Even  telep- 
athy, for  instance,  now  established  beyond  peradventure  of 
doubt,  as  a  common  possibility  of  the  subconscious,  were  it 
brought  universally  into  play  as  an  active  faculty,  would  make 
hell,  where  now  we  fortunately  have  but  the  ante-room  of 
hell  —  in  regard  to  industry  and  commerce.  The  stronger 
would  use  it  to  the  impoverishment  of  the  weak,  as  they  do  now 
with  every  other  tool.  Telepathy  is  akin  to  mind-reading. 
If  I  can  receive  thought  messages  sent  to  me  intentionally,  it 
will  require  but  a  slight  extension  of  the  power  to  enable  me  to 
take  forcibly  thoughts,  messages  and  private  secrets,  not  in- 
tended for  me.  That  would  give  me  an  unsportsmanlike  ad- 
vantage over  the  rest  of  mankind.  As  long  as  we  gouge  each 
other  with  the  tools  we  have,  we  would  act  in  just  as  unsports- 
manlike fashion  with  more  perfect  or  more  powerful  tools.. 
To  eliminate  danger,  we  see  now  how  necessary  it  is  that  an 
attitude  toward  life,  constructive,  healthful  and  helpful,  be  in- 
stalled as  the  main  machine  in  the  subconscious  mind,  before 
sleeping  abilities  are  awakened. 


Every  ability  that  has  ever  been  manifested  in  the  world  is 
either  active  in  you,  asleep  in  you,  or  dreaming  in  you. 

Every  evil  that  has  ever  been  thought  or  practiced  is  either 
active  in  you,  asleep  in  you,  or  dreaming  in  you. 

Shakespeare,  Beethoven,  Napoleon,  Edison,  Burbank,  Christ, 
Buddha,  Manu,  Magicians,  Sorcerers,  Sibyls  and  Prophets,  —  are 
either  active,  asleep  or  dreaming  in  you. 

Psychology  will  not  put  to  sleep  those  qualities  which  damn 
you  by  their  actions  if  they  ARE  awakened. 

Psychology  will  not  awaken  those  qualities  which  you  fancy 
you  would  desire. 

Your  COMPREHENSION  of  psychology,  plus  your  appli- 
cation of  what  you  comprehend,  WILL  "bind  or  loose"  any  or  all 
of  them,  ACCORDING  to  your  faith  and  character. 


LESSON  V. 
REACHING  THE  INNER  MIND 

THE  topic  of  the  Subconscious  Mind  is,  of  course,  inde- 
pendent of  any  limits  which  we  could  prescribe.  We  can 
turn  our  attention  to  such  angles  of  vision  as  will  most 
efficiently  give  us  a  working  grasp  of  the  indications  and  hints 
which  psychology  has  accumulated.  To  arrive  at  such  a  "work- 
ing grasp"  it  is  necessary  to  devise  if  possible  certain  working 
formulas,  the  intelligent  use  of  which  may  be  expected  to  bring 
about  definite,  dependable  and  desirable  results.  A  chemical 
formula  means  nothing  to  one  not  acquainted  with  the  rudi- 
ments of  chemistry.  Likewise,  with  the  formulas  herein  to  be 
given, — their  use  will  result  in  nothing,  or  in  worse  than  noth- 
ing, if  what  has  foregone  is  treated  as  of  no  importance.  The 
best  artisans  use  their  tools  in  a  manner  so  efficient  as  to  excite 
the  wonder  and  admiration  of  the  beholder.  That  is  because 
the  best  artisans  know  their  tools;  they  could  construct  new 
and  better  tools  if  the  ones  they  have  were  to  break.  So  it  is 
with  the  laws  of  mind;  one  must  see  their  necessity,  their  im- 
portance, their  construction;  one  must  understand  their  why 
and  how  before  they  will  justify  the  complete  dependability 
which  the  advanced  student  places  upon  them. 

We  saw  that  the  "big"  thing  which  animates  the  subcon- 
scious mind  is  the  predominant  mental  impression  which 
reigns  there.  We  have  not  only  one  such  predominant  im- 
pression, but  many.  In  regard  to  every  cardinal  aspect  or 
feature  of  life,  you  have  some  sort  of  conviction,  or  predomi- 
nant impression.  You  will  accept  things  out  of  that  particular 
channel  or  aspect  of  life,  only  according  to  some  conviction  of 
your  character.  It  does  not  matter  in  the  least  whether  you 
admit  to  yourself  or  others  that  your  character  has  such  secret 
controllers  and  animators;  admission  and  inadmission  of  that 
sort  is  part  of  your  present  surface  thinking,  which  in  the  course 
of  time  may  modify  your  fundamental  character  if  persisted  in. 

79 


80  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

Is  there  a  "short  cut''  way  of  changing  the  undesirable 
predominant  subconscious  impressions?  Inferring  from  sud- 
den changes  in  character;  sudden  mental  degenerations  and  just 
as  sudden  and  seeming  miraculous  regenerations,  "conver- 
sions," and  reforms;  inferring  from  instantaneous  healings  of 
mental  and  physical  diseases  and  malformations, — psychology 
says  there  undoubtedly  is  a  short  cut. 

Tho'  we  must  writh  broad  tolerance  view  the  claims  of 
persons  healed,  that  some  particular  doctrine  or  religious  de- 
nomination possesses  the  last  word  in  explanation  of  how  it 
happened,  yet  psychology  says  there  is  a  similarity  in  procedure 
which  goes  before  each  and  every  instantaneous  and  genuine 
"conversion"  or  physical  cure.  If  we  will  glue  our  observation, 
our  powers  of  analysis  and  of  synthesis,  to  that  thread  of  simi- 
larity, and  really  know  what  it  is,  then  says  psychology,  we  will 
know  how  actually  to  reach  the  subconscious  mind,  and  also 
how  to  substitute  constructive  fundamental  impressions  there 
to  replace  the  old  and  destructive  ones. 

How  TO  BUILD  A  FORMULA 

First,  then,  to  learn  our  "tools;" — the  best  observations 
so  far  vouchsafed  of  those  "traces"  which  denote  a  miraculous 
subconscious  activity,  have  occurred  as  a  rule  during  "trance," 
whether  induced  by  hypnotism  or  otherwise.  That  means  first 
that  the  objective  processes  of  mind  are  in  such  instances  in 
abeyance.  But  it  means  first  that  the  body,  its  posture  or  activ- 
ities in  no  wise  attracted  the  attention  of  the  mind, — otherwise 
the  attention  so  required  will  keep  the  objective  operations 
active.  We  are  building  our  formula  for  reaching  the  subcon- 
scious mind  by  a  short  cut,  and  find  that  the  first  requisite  in 
that  formula  is 

^      Physical  Relaxation. 

The  second  feature  is  not  hard  to  find,  whether  the  at- 
tempt to  re-impress  the  subconscious  mind  is  pursued  thru 
hypnotic  procedure  or  otherwise.  The  sick  negro  in  Hayti  has 
done  all  the  reasoning  and  arguing  he  is  going  to  do  before 
calling  in  the  dreaded  practitioner  of  "voodoo,"  who,  tho 
dreaded,  yet  has  the  power  of  life  and  of  death  in  his  grimy 
fists, — according  to  the  sick  one's  deepest  faith.  The  weary 
pilgrim  to  the  cave  of  Our  Madonna  of  the  Lourdes  is  not 
going  there  to  engage  in  quarrels  in  exegesis  or  in  differences 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  81 

of  opinion  over  canonical  authorities.  This  mental  "letting 
go"  of  everything,  most  of  all,  letting  go  of  the  mental  rivet 
or  fixation  on  the  undesired  or  unworthy  condition  itself,  is  of 
equal  importance  to  the  physical  relaxation.  We  shall  call 
this  second  ingredient  of  our  formula 

Mental  Passivity. 

The  more  this  "letting  go"  process  has  been  expertly  ful- 
filled, the  mcwe  does  the  subconscious,  then  in  line  with  the  ob- 
jective mind,  photograph  as  an  indelible  picture,  whatever 
engages  the  attention  at  the  magical  moment.  If  the  objective 
mind  has  been  paralyzed  thru  hypnotism,  then  the  object  itself, 
and  not  the  objective  opinion  about  it,  is  the  impression  made. 
When  we  speak  of  a  sudden  burst  of  inspiration  or  enthusiasm, 
we  commonly  say  that  the  person  so  inspired  or  enthused  "let 
himself  go."  It  means,  psychologically,  that  his  objective  self 
at  such  a  time  was  reinforced  by  the  energies  and  other  re- 
sources of  the  subconscious  mind.  In  a  destructive  sense,  but 
just  as  truly  do  we  awaken  similar  energies  when  we  indulge  in 
a  fit  of  intense  anxiety,  anger  or  fear.  It  is  psychologically 
just  as  much  of  a  "letting  go"  as  any  other.  It  furnishes  what 
one  might  aptly  call  a  "camera  moment."  At  such  a  moment 
as  that,  whatever  engages  the  attention  becomes  indelibly  fixed 
in  the  subconscious  character,  there  to  work  out  according  to 
its  type  in  your  personality  and  hence  in  your  future  welfare. 
The  ancients  called  such  moments,  whether  deliberately  'in- 
duced or  accidentally  indulged,  "mantic  frenzy."  But  here 
is  the  gist  psychologically,  here  is  the  valuable  thing  for  which 
the  letting  go  of  mental  endeavor  is  necessary — that  the  atten- 
tion may  be  fixed  on  One  Thing.  The  One  Thing,  with  the  stu- 
dent practicing  along  lines  suggested  by  all  that  has  now  fore- 
gone, will  be  the  new  or  efficient  predominant  mental  impres- 
sion, which  is  to  dominate  over  inadequate  old  ones.  Hence 
the  third  feature  of  our  formula  for  reaching  and  improving 
the,  impresses  of  the  subconscious  mind  is 

Fixation  of  Attention. 

Now  it  is  not  necessary  to  go  into  brainstorms,  or  convul- 
sions, or  into  hysteria,  to  get  fixation  of  attention.  Indeed, 
the  more  one  can  make  the  mind  motionless  before  that  condi- 
tion is  brought  into  play,  the  better  and  more  sane  and  more 
clear  will  be  the  impression;  and  later  the  more  strong  will  be 


82  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AXD  ESSENTIAL 

the  working  out  of  that  impression  into  actuality.  A  quiet 
assurance,  yet  ever  so  deep,  that  one  is  fulfilling  a  formula 
exact  as  a  mathematical  formula  is  exact,  is  the  best  attitude  to 
maintain. 

A  verse  of  a  few  lines  occurs  to  mind.  It  is  quite  apro- 
pos at  this  juncture,  as  it  depicts  in  one  octave  the  state  of  mind 
necessary  to  secure  the  fixation  on  an  ideal  to  be  attained,  even 
if  for  the  time  the  "ideal"  is  not  so  loftily  vague  as  the  lines 
would  have  it.  The  energies  otherwise  wasted  in  the  pyro- 
technics of  emotional  agonies,  frenzies,  hysterias,  etc.,  so  often 
unnecessarily  accompanying  inner  psychological,  or  even  re- 
ligious endeavors,  can  as  well  be  so  restrained  and  directed  as 
to  make  all  the  stronger  the  NEW  ORDER  which  you  are  going 
to  implant  upon  the  tablets  of  the  subconscious  during  the 
moment  of  the  fixation.  The  writer  probably  had  some  idea 
of  that  sort  in  mind  when  putting  down  the  lines.  The  desire 
expressed  to  rise  past  "meditation"  is  worthy  of  note.  It  is  pos- 
sible that  a  limited  (not  the  dictionary)  meaning  is  given  the 
word.  The  imbroglio  of  thought-arguments  which  arise  in 
mind  sometimes  to  confuse  the  inept  concentrator  is  probably 
meant. 

Then  view  in  peace  the  high  star  worlds  this  night, 
With  quiet  gaze  so  rise  past  meditation 
That  dark  or  petty  things  of  life,  thru  concentration 
So  consecrated  clear,  must  fail  to  pierce- 
That  in  frustration 
Must  flee  all  thoughts  but  one- 
All  thoughts  but  one  must,  helpless,  take  to  flight. 

Rather  tough  on  the  helpless  thoughts, — and  yet  there  is 
enough  in  the  lines  to  constitute  a  sort  of  "direction,"  in  apply- 
ing the  formula.  Probably  it  would  be  a  little  difficult  to  define 
that  self  same  "direction,"  and  yet,  if  we  tried,  it  would  amount 
to  this:  So  fix  the  new  standard  in  your  mind,  for  days  in 
advance,  that  during  the  practice  quarter  hour  or  half  hour, 
other  thoughts  will  have  little  chance  to  activate  your  mind; 
they  will  indeed  be  "helpless." 

If  we  try  to  apply  this  formula  with  too  much  vigor,  in 
other  words,  we  are  likely  to  overstep  the  fine  line  of  effective- 
ness. Most  powerful  effects  are  brought  about  spontaneously 
and  easily.  This  can  almost  be  held  as  a  dogma  in  psycho- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  83 

logical  practices.  We  shall  discuss  it  more  fully  a  little  later. 
But  in  the  meantime,  remember  that  in  the  moment  of  the 
"fixation  of  attention,"  you  have  what  many  psychologists  call 
a  "psychological  moment,"  during  which  you  are  the  master 
of  a  photographing  camera, — and  the  photographs  that  you 
then  take  by  ear,  by  eye,  by  emotion,  by  any  perception,  inner 
or  outer,  will  subtly  rule  you  thereafter, — modified  only  by 
other  such  photographs  already  existing  and  strong  enough  to 
conflict  with  the  new  one. 

The  famous  "curse  of  the  Hapsburgs"  was  probably  ef- 
fected at  least  in  part  thru  an  accidental  employment  of  the 
psychological  factors  shown  as  the  three  ingredients  of  our  "in- 
fallible formula."  The  grieved  and,  it  may  be,  partly  insane 
noblewoman  when  delivering  that  historic  malediction  upon 
Francis  Joseph,  certainly  had  the  latter's  undivided,  hypnotic, 
or  "fixed"  attention.  While  listening  to  that  horrible  sequence 
of  prophecies,  all  pictures  of  horrors  and  disasters  to  occur 
in  the  lives  of  those  he  most  loved, — we  would  not  imagine  him 
as  concerned  over  the  ventilation  of  the  room  or  with  anything 
whatever  to  do  with  his  body.  We-  would  not;  fancy  him  as 
mentally  occupied  with  a  mortgage,  or  a  note,  or  giving 
his  mind  to  any  of  those  things  which  usually  fritter  away 
the  average  student's  best  psychological  opportunities.  If  the 
same  woman,  with  the  same  frenzied  energy,  had  then  and 
there  in  that  manner  pierced  the  shell  of  Francis  Joseph's 
objective  personality  with  prophecies  of  growth  and  expan- 
sion for  his  family  and  empire, — well,  we  can  but  wonder. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be,  after  all,  that  in  her  "mantic 
frenzy,"  she  saw  clairvoyantly  and  prophetically  into  the  future 
of  the  king  she  felt  had  needlessly  robbed  her  of  her  son, 
and  in  that  dramatic  manner  recited  what  she  saw.  Never- 
theless, even  that  would  again  show  that  fixation  of  atten- 
tion had  been  brought  about  in  her  through  that  terrific  surge 
of  emotion  or  mantic  frenzy,  and  that  this  moment  of  fixation 
is,  therefore,  more  replete  with  "miracle"  than  carelessly  other- 
wise we  would  have  thought. 

I  WISH  I  KNEW  WHAT  TO  WISH  FOR 

How  common  an  attitude  this  is !  And  yet,  in  the  little 
citation  just  concluded,  we  have  a  clew  how  the  formula  may 
be  applied  to  help  in  this  very  situation.  If  within  the  un- 


84  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

plumbed  depths  and  heights  of  consciousness  there  is  a  depart- 
ment that  knows  even  the  future,  then  surely  there  are  depart- 
ments that  know  well  what  is  best  for  you  as  personality  "to 
do."  It  is  a  mistake,  however,  to  assume  or  to  expect  that  such 
departments  of  your  cosmic  being  will  command  you  positive- 
ly. If  we  have  made  even  one  item  of  things  psychological 
clear  to  the  student  by  this  time,  we  hope  it  has  been  this :  You 
as  objective  personality  are  the  only  fraction  in  the  entire  of 
your  being,  which  during  the  earth  life  is  positive.  The  voice 
depicting  what  to  do  is  still  and  small — passive — negative. 
Each  prejudice  and  whim  can  easily  out  "holler"  it.  Often, 
those  not  evolved  far  enough  for  true  endeavor  inflate  some 
selfish  desire ;  the  next  step  is  wonder  at  the  proportions  and 
power  of  the  desire;  still  the  next  step  with  such  is  to  decide 
that  it  could  not  be  so  vast  unless  their  "soul"  or  "god"  wanted 
them  to  do  or  possess  the  thing  desired.  Such  "rational 
maniacs"  spout  from  platforms  in  every  town  and  city;  nothing 
is  so  irresistable  as  mania.  But  it  is  not  the  kind  of  "advance" 
really  needed.  Too  much  semi-insanity  and  quasi-sanity  is 
already  among  us. 

Let  us  made  a  demand  on  the  soul,  if  we  employ  the  fore- 
going formula,  for  SANITY  FIRST.  Grow  as  enthusiastic  in 
anticipating  a  psychological  exercise  for  that  object  as  you 
would  in  "holding  the  thought"  for  a  new  automobile  so  fer- 
vently advocated  by  some  of  the  "prosperity  cults."  Con- 
tinued for  a  season,  it  will  enable  you  to  tap  a  veritable  well- 
spring  of  philosophy  and  ethics.  The  influence  of  that  spring, 
welling  from  within,  will  cause  you  to  view  things  mathematical- 
ly and  yet  sympathetically,  instead  of  in  the  common  emotional 
way,  that  is  either  repelled  from  a  thing  or  condition  by  dis- 
like, or  on  the  other  hand  merely  gushes  and  brays  in  true  jack- 
ass fashion  over  the  thing  or  condition  it  "likes." 

Sanity  established,  then  and  not  till  then,  is  the  time  to 
progress  and  to  act  with  every  tool  at  one's  command.  The 
formula  and  all  that  went  before,  which  must  be  imagined  as 
concentrated  within  the  formula,  is  one  of  the  tools  now  in 
hand.  If  sane,  use  that  formula;  it  is  a  sin  of  omission  not  to 
use  it.  The  insane  are  using  it  and  there  are  many  of  them. 
If  you  lack  sanity,  use  the  same  formula  to  get  it.  It  is  a  crime 
against  yourself  to  use  it  for  any  other  purpose  than  that,  if 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  85 

you  are  still  subject  to  personal  or  to  racial  insanities.     Think 
well,  then  think  again. 

A  BIT  OF  PSYCHOANALYSIS  EN  PASSANT 

While  thinking,  also  think  over  this :  Automatically 
every  feature  of  that  formula  you  have  used  since  you  were  one 
second  old  as  measured  by  an-  Elgin  watch.  You  could  not 
help  it.  You  used  it  automatically.  When  your  mother  told 
you  bedside  stories,  your  body  was  relaxed;  your  mind  was  at 
rest;  you  gave  the  narrative  of  adventure,  of  courage,  of  dar- 
ing,— or  the  story  of  goody-goodiness  or  wish-washiness, — you 
gave  all  that  your  undivided,  and  often  your  "fixed"  hypnotic 
attention.  When  some  adult  stopped  you  abruptly  with  a  ter- 
rible threat,  warning,  or  "prophecy"  in  regard  to  what  would 
happen  if  you  "did"  this  or  that,  again  subconsciously  you 
photographed  a  terribly  potent  "photograph"  right  then  and 
there.  The  conversation  you  overheard,  that  you  had  no  busi- 
ness to  overhear,  according  to  adult  standards,  photographed 
itself  with  intensity  because  then  your  objective  operations, 
bodily  and  mental,  were  very,  very  still.  The  sight  you  saw, 
that  you  were  not  supposed  to  see,  did  likewise;  because  every 
time  you  puzzled  over  it  thereafter,  it  grew  very,  very  strong; 
and  because  no  one  explained  to  you  what  it  all  meant,  certain 
of  your  childhood  phantasies  in  regard  to  that  sight,  to  those 
words,  or  to  other  impressions, — these  infantile  phantasies  still 
dominate  you.  Psychically  you  still  have  the  3  or  4-year-old 
in  you. 

Subconsciously,  no  matter  if  you  are  80  years  old,  you  still 
respond,  and  are  drawn  into  many  situations  of  life  because  of 
that  subconscious  search  for  the  mother,  the  father,  or  to  what- 
ever else  represented  felicity  to  the  babe.  Some  of  those  infan- 
tile phantasies  are  desirable.  Some  are  undesirable.  Some  of 
them  have  become  "sublimated"  into  noble  actions.  But  on 
some  of  them  the  incrustations  of  fear  fantasies  have  kept  you 
down, — have  kept  you  out  of  entire  sectors  of  life  and  action 
so  far.  Do  you  wish  to  enter  such  self-inhibited,  self-forbidden 
sectors?  'Then  use  the  formula — for  sanity  first.  We  see 
now  that  precaution  is  not  so  unnecessary  after  all.  It  is  quite 
necessary.  It  will  give  you,  first  of  all,  power  and  courage  to 
face  yourself.  It  will  give  you  the  power  to  call  a  spade  a 
spade,  even  if  it  is  an  agricultural  implement.  Of  course,  when 


86  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

thus  "shaking  loose"  from  undesirable  subconscious  sources 
of  fear  and  incapacity,  certain  of  our  more  pleasant  illusions 
concerning  ourselves  also  "go"  in  the  process.  But  the  com- 
pensation is  this:  We  find  the  truth  underlying  the  layer  of 
illusions,  by  far  a  more  vital  thing,  and  to  the  sane  mind,  more 
attractive  than  the  most  alluring  mental  postures  and  poses 
with  which  theretofore  we  may  have  tried  to  impress  our- 
selves and  others. 

THE  EFFECT  OF  EXPERIENCE 

Experience  may  occur  to  us  physically,  psychically,  or 
I  mentally.  All  experiences  are  stored  in  the  subconscious  mind. 
The  inner  archives  are  like  unto  a  dictaphone  and  motion  pic- 
ture camera  combined.  But  every  genuine  experience  so  stored 
away  is  cushioned  about  with  living  feeling  or  thought.  Noth- 
ing that  has  ever  happened  to  you  is  dead  merely  because  you 
have  neglected,  forgotten,  or  repudiated  it.  The  living  feel- 
ing or  thought  surrounding  each  occurrence  occupies  more 
"space,"  is  more  weighty  by  far  than  the  nucleus  of  experience 
to  which  it  impinges.  It  is  wreighty  either  with  anxiety  or  with 
expectation.  Imagine  a  glass  of  very  clear  jam  or  jelly; 
imagine  that  this  comestible  is  made  of  strawberries.  Look 
thru  it  at  the  sun.  In  the  wine  colored  yet  translucent  sub- 
stance you  see  innumerable  seeds, — yet  by  volume,  if  those  seeds 
were  segregated,  you  would  probably  have  a  half  thimbleful 
and  the  diminution  in  the  volume  of  jam  or  jelly  would  not  be 
noticeable.  Now  imagine  that  the  little  solid  points  of  actual 
experience  stored  in  the  subconscious  are  just  like  that.  They 
are  numerous,  of  course,  but  are  entirely  surrounded  and  float 
///  our  feelings  and  phantasies  in  regard  to  them.  Around  but 
very  few  of  such  points  of  experience  is  the  surrounding  feeling 
in  tune  with  fact.  Moreover,  the  ujell"  which  we  have  built 
around  each  such  point,  usually  disagrees  or  contradicts  another 
kind  of  phantasy  which  we  have  built  or  wound  round  a  neigh- 
boring point,  and  so  on.  The  fears  and  hopes  around  one 
contradict  the  fears  and  hopes  around  another. 

When  it  is  seen  that  the  waking,  every  day  personality  is 
in  one  sense  the  "out-working"  of  the  subconscious  self,  we  see 
that  the  past  events  and  occurrences  of  any  given  life  are  not 
the  dominant  things  controlling  that  life  now.  "You"  are  the 
sum  total  of  the  kind  of  emotional  and  mental  reactions  you 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  87 

have  given  events  and  occurrences.  The  occurrences  them- 
selves do  not  much  matter.  Among  many  psychologists,  all 
these  reactions, — in  fact,  anything  which  then  or  later  is  to 
affect  the  workings  of  the  subconscious  mind,  goes  by  the  gen- 
eric name  of  "Suggestion."  Understood  in  that  sense,  it  will 
save  many  students  disappointment;  for  there  are  "teachers" 
with  limited  and  inadequate  knowledge  in  these  matters,  whose 
only  idea  of  a  Suggestion  is  something  merely  spoken  to  one's 
self  or  another  in  quite  a  positive  or  almost  vindictive  manner. 
Yet,  if  care  and  persistence  is  used  to  widen  and  enlarge  the 
meaning  implied  in  that  word  suggestion,  then  it  becomes  true 
that  SUGGESTION,  NOTHING  MORE  AND  NOTHING  LESS,  IS  THE- 

ACTIVATOR  OF  SUBCONSCIOUSNESS. 

If  such  a  suggestion  has  been  built  around  a  memory  of  a 
painful  experience,  quite  likely  it  is  not  in  line  with  fact.  You 
have  built  some  kind  of  phantasy  or  "white  lie"  about  it.  You 
may  not  have  done  this  as  a  matter  of  deliberation.  The  point 
is, — to  the  extent  that  the  fantasy-mechanism  is  there  be- 
cause of  fearing  to  face  the  fact  itself,  to  that  extent  is  it  harm- 
ful. Things  psychologically  done  because  of  fear,  in  effect  are 
as  bad  as  the  fear  itself. 

The  subconscious  mind  is  a  "faultless  recorder  of  every- 
thing that  has  transpired  throughout  the  life.  We  are  all  fa- 
miliar with  instances  that  illustrate  this  point.  Two  or  three 
cases  are  on  record,  one,  if  I  recall  in  the  book  "Man's  Uncon- 
scious Conflict,"  by  Wilfrid  Lay,  Ph.D.,  of  an  elderly  woman, 
who,  in  her  early  'teens,  had  been  within  hearing  range  (but 
had  neyer  objectively  listened  to)  recitations  in  Hebrew;  it  is 
a  number  of  decades  after  this  that  she  is  ill,  and  in  delirium 
mystifies  those  at  the  bedside  with  recitations  in  the  strange 
language.  The  unconscious,  or  rather  the  subconscious,  there 
showed  that  it  remembers  impressions  gathered  by  the  percep- 
tions. It  remembers  these,  whether  or  not  they  are  objectively 
learned  in  the  accepted  sense.  The  recording  is  done  with 
equal  impartiality  in  either  case. 

In.  the  years  of  infancy,  certain  specific  things  are  so  "laid 
in"  with  a  greater  amount  of  feeling  than  with  other  things. 
This  overweight  of  emotional  concern  will  accompany  impres- 
sions that  have  anything  at  all  to  do  with  what  the  infantile 
subconscious  carries  as  its  three  dominant  "urges."  Those 


88  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

dominant  urges,  which  nothing  can  uproot,  are  the  yearnings 
toward  Life,  Love  and  Activity.  Love  and  Sex,  even  in  the 
tiny  infant,  tho'  latent  objectively,  yet  in  the  subconscious  sense, 
constitute  the  magnet  that  incites  accumulation  of  observed 
facts.  Anything  that  bears  on  the  "magnet"  itself,  therefore, 
arouses  a  volume  of  energy,  for  which  the  infant  as  yet  has  no 
means  of  disposal.  Hence  such  infantile  impressions,  as  it 
were  uturn  upon  themselves"  in  the  form  of  phantasy  and  fable- 
building.  These  inner  distortions  and  fables,  later  in  life,  will 
make  of  the  sex  life,  and  consequently  of  the  emotional  and 
psychic  life,  a  thing  according  to  their  own  nature.  If  the  act- 
ing out  of  those  buried  impressions  is  contrary  to  accepted 
social  usages,  then  in  the  average  individual  there  will  grow 
up  the  faculty  of  psychic  repression,  which  may,  by  its  close 
connection  (already  seen)  with  the  very  wellsprings  of  life, 
impair  the  person's  life  and  efficiency  as  a  social  unit.  This, 
then,  is  the  context  of  that  padding  and  cushioning  of  feeling 
and  of  thought,  with  which  we  surround  in  our  subconscious- 
ness  the  bare  facts,  occurrences  and  experiences  of  life.  It  is  a 
condition  obtaining  with  every  human  being  on  earth,  in  greater 
or  lesser  degree.  Its  kind  and  degree  is  the  root  to  study  and 
to  comprehend  if  we  wish  to  know  more  why  the  tree  shows 
the  form  of  success  or  failur'e. 

Yet,  taking  the  broad  and  thorough  meaning  which  now 
should  go  with  the  word  "Suggestion"  (preceded  where  the 
"photograph"  or  impression  has  been  deeply  engrafted  upon 
the  subconscious,  by  relaxation,  passivity,  and  fixation  of  atten- 
tion)— we  see  then  that  all  this  psychic  operation,  where  un- 
worthy or  undesirable, — has  been  accomplished  through  ig- 
norant application  of  that  potent  tool  of  mind.  Accidentally, 
some  suggestions  may  be  good;  they  often  are.  But  the  pur- 
J  pose  of  psychology  is  to  learn  how  to  draw  life  away  from  the 
dizzy  precipice  of  uncertainties  and  accidental  benefits.  Psy- 
chology recommends  the  best  use  of  what  tools  we  have.  Its 
method  of  determining  a  tool  is  to  find  out  first  what  we  are 
doing  automatically  and  ignorantly,  and  then  to  make  the  same 
process  objective  and  intelligent.  Plainly,  its  purpose  is  to 
draw  that  which  is  hidden  out  into  the  sunlight.  If  auto- 
matically we  have  been  using  suggestion  and  to  our  own  detri- 
ment, then,  if  we  learn  to  do  the  same  thing  consciously,  we  can 
improve  the  results  heretofore  seen.  We  can  learn,  by  per- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  89 

severance,  to  do  wisely  and  well  what  has  been  done  ignorantly 
without  our  objective  knowledge. 

Again,  the  subconscious,  tho'  it  has  worked  out  sugges- 
tions ignorantly,  as  just  stated, — yet  the  word  would  probably 
describe  psychologic  fact  better  if  we  twisted  it  into  "ignor- 
ingly"  All  that  we  have  ever  learned  of  suggestion,  and  all 
that  we  are  likely  to  learn,  must  be  borrowed  from  observations 
of  the  subconscious  itself.  Hence,  the  subconscious  is  not  ig- 
norant of  suggestion.  It  ignores,  however,  your  aims,  your 
ideals,  and  your  best  wishes.  Its  business  is  solely  and  com- 
pletely that  of  working  out  suggestions  implanted  upon  it.  It 
is  YOU  who  must  learn  how  to  incorporate  your  ideals  and  best 
wishes  into  that  mechanism  of  Suggestion. 

The  first  thing  in  learning  to  do  this  is  to  learn  how  to 
face  the  condition  prevailing  in  the  lower  subconscious  mind. 
If  the  situation  there  prevailing  is  ignored,  it  acts  as  a  basement 
foundation  that  has,  by  flood  or  earthquake,  been  thrown  out 
of  plumb  and  into  a  slant.  The  entire  superstructure  of  sub- 
conscious and  even  of  objective  operations  will  then  be  "out  of 
kilter;"  neuroses  and  failure  will  be  there,  maybe  ill  health 
physically  as  well.  The  first  use  of  the  Formula  should  be 
for  Sanity,  as  we  said  before, — but  for  self-analysis  as  well, 
as  we  will  say  now.  Not  to  add  to  the  subconscious  clutter,  but 
to  straighten  out  what  is  there,  should  be  the  first  aim. 

We  must  put  forth  effort  to  become  effective  and  efficient 
human  beings  before  we  go  about  bombastically  storming  the 
gates  of  heaven.  Willingness  is  not  enough;  ability  must  ac- 
company it.  The  effectiveness  or  ineffectiveness  of  personality 
is  gauged  and  determined  by  the  number  and  virulence  of  inner 
"complexes,"  the  nature  of  which  we  have  but  touched  upon. 
Any  artificially  built  up — and  then  ignored — phantasy  sur- 
rounding the  impress  of  an  undesirable  experience,  is  called  a 
complex.  This  is  but  an  "outline,"  and  the  discussion  of  such 
contents  of  the  subconscious  has  been  by  no  means  complete. 
We  have  but  brushed  on  the  first  big  task  that  confronts  every 
true  student  of  psychology.  Many  "teachers"  ignore  this 
phase;  but  with  such  it  is  of  common  note,  that  the  students 
derive  no  more  lasting  benefit  than  a  chance  to  worship  the 
teacher  while  that  person  deigns  to  stay  in  any  given  city. 

As  Wilfrid  Lay  so  well  points  out, — if  a  mere  thought 
can  induce  a  flow  of  energy  and  blood  to  the  face  and  cause 


90  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

a  blush,  there  is  no  reason  to  doubt  similar,  slower  but  more 
subtle  and  powerful  physiological  effects  from  more  funda- 
mental attitudes  of  mind.  Thus,  a  young  girl  rather  imper- 
tinently questioned  by  a  mother  who  could  ill-disguise  her  own 
prurient  complexes,  becomes  deaf.  The  desire  of  the  girl  not 
to  hear  the  mother  is  the  Suggestion  in  this  instance,  and  the 
deafness  is  a  wish  fulfillment.  A  man  who  has  lost  his  love  for 
his  wife,  yet  unwilling  to  bring  upon  her  and  the  family  all 
the  "shake-up"  that  divorce  would  entail,  suddenly  goes  blind. 
Subconsciously,  the  Suggestion  is,  "blindness  will  the  most  likely 
allow  me  to  live  as  If  she  were  not  with  me,"  again  the  "ignor- 
ing" way  of  creating  a  wish  fulfillment.  Partial  paralysis  has 
been  known  to  follow  sometimes  as  the  result  of  a  long  nursed 
resentment  at  having  to  do  intimate  or  menial  chores  for 
others.  In  most  instances  of  this  kind,  merely  the  Suggestion 
for  health  would  not  do  at  all.  All  the  "holding  the  thought" 
in  the  world  would  only  add  to  the  malady,  or  cover  it  up  with 
a  yet  deeper  incrustation  of  lies.  Almost  invariably,  the  hope 
of  cure  lies  first  in  intellectualizing  the  hidden  emotion — the 
concealed  attitude.  It  is  difficult,  because  the  objective  person- 
ality will  deny  upstandingly  the  existence  of  each  and  all  of 
the  real  causes  of  the  disorder.  Often  healing,  therefore,  is 
to  be  expected  as  part  of  a  re-education;  for  otherwise  the 
patient  continues  to  feed  the  causes  of  his  trouble.  But  all  this 
is  improved  when  we  begin  to  see  that  all  attitudes  of  mind 
are  energic,  not  static.  That  is  to  say,  mental  attitudes  act  as 
energies,  with  a  semi-intelligence  built  up  as  already  shown,— 
while  at  the  same  time  acting  as  channels  or  conductors  for 
other  forms  of  force  and  energy. 

Then  when  this  view  has  been  thoroughly  established,  you 
will  see  the  necessity  of  work.  This  enables  the  energies  of 
body  and  mind  to  carry  out  the  ROOT  SUGGESTION  OF  THE  RACE 
—to  do  something  worth  while  outwardly.  The  ROOT  SUG- 
GESTION referred  to  just  now,  if  it  could  be  vocalized,  would 
tell  us  that  we  must  do  something  to  impress  material  en- 
vironment. We  must  do  something  that  will  make  the  world 
a  little  better  for  those  who  are  younger,  and  for  those  not  yet 
born.  The  ROOT  SUGGESTION  says  we  dare  not  feed  on  our 
own  emotions;  it  says  if  we  pity  ourselves,  or  worry  ourselves, 
or  are  anxious,  we  will  get  plenty  of  things  to  fear  and  to  be 
nnxious  about.  It.  says  to  do  something  for  the  bettering  of 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  91 

material  and  outward  conditions,  it  is  not  necessary  to  indulge 
in  rhapsodies  about  man's  glorious  future.  It  says  juggle  the 
garbage  cans  at  your  kitchen  door,  if  this  morning  the  servant 
is  indisposed.  It  says,  get  a  hammer  and  pin  down  the  loose 
corner  of  that  rug  yourself,  if  husband  is  busy,  or  if  the  carpet 
layers  are  not  available.  It  says  indulge  your  selfishness  less, 
even  if  you  have  been  prone  to  disguise  that  selfishness  by  at- 
tendance of  "uplift"  meetings,  or  by  taking  it  out  in  the  wor- 
ship of  some  itinerant  "psychologist."  If  you  yearn  to  write 
poetry  instead  of  doing  all  these  things,  /'/  makes  rejoinder  that 
your  poetry  will  then  be  of  better  savour.  Probably  then  some- 
one will  actually  read  it,  and  even  enjoy  doing  so.  If  you  rein- 
force the  subconscious  and  ingrained  tendency  toward  in- 
grainedness  by  demanding  service  when  you  yourself  are  not 
serving,  your  attitude  toward  life  then  is  infantile.  Subcon- 
sciously the  babe  of  a  few  months  still  dominates  you.  In  soul 
growth  you  are  then  still  the  puling  infant.  Here  then  is  the 
reason  and  the  rationale  behind  that  oft  repeated  slogan :  When 
feeling  sorry  for  yourself,  do  something  for  somebody  else 
QUICK.  How  many  "babes"  we  have  among  our  "great  ones." 
Among  kings  and  potentates;  among  government  officials; 
corporation  heads  and  executives;  down  to  the  neurotic  social 
leader,  who  admits  incapacity  for  real  life  by  adopting  a  con- 
summately artificial  pose, — mere  infants,  bawling  and  screech- 
ing that  the  rest  of  the  social  family  give  them  for  nothing  the 
things  they  want  just  as  the  baby  "gets"  its  needs.  As  the 
babe  tyrannizes  over  the  rest  of  all  our  ill-regulated  families,  so 
in  the  family  politic  the  infant  still  gets  his  way,  because  the 
rest  of  the  family  are  dunces. 

No  one  is  to  blame,  except  if  we  take  the  extreme  posi- 
tion that  ignorance  is  blameworthy  always.  But  we  see  Nature 
prodigally  bestowing  failure  and  disease  wherever  her  laws  are 
ignored.  So  whether  we  blame  or  refrain  from  blaming,  it  is 
at  least  prudent  to  learn.  Sympathetic  learning  in  itself  seems 
practically  the  complete  "fulfilling  of  the  law."  Some  day  it 
will  be  a  slogan  of  healing,  that  "In  the  correct  and  complete 
diagnosis  lies  the  cure."  It  will  be  seen  that  no  more  is  re- 
quired of  any  ill  than  to  diagnose  it  properly,  to  make  it  vanish. 
Why?  Because  the  cause  of  the  majority  of  disorders  is  pas- 
sional and  emotional,  below  the  mind,  not  admitted  to,  or 
repudiated  by  the  mind.  The  mind  represents  sunlight;  the 


92  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

position  of  the  causes  of  the  disease  before  diagnosis,  is  in  the 
dark  and  damp  basement,  where  vile  things  breed  and  batten. 
Once  the  offending  cause  is  hauled  out  into  the  germicidal  sun- 
light of  rational  analysis,  it  loses  its  effectiveness  for  evil  and 
ill.  To  maintain  the  pose  that  one  is  too  much  of  a  saint  to 
harbor  such  complexes  is  the  most  effective  defense  that  the 
disordered  phase  of  the  subconscious  could  have  induced  you 
to  take.  It  is  the  same  as  saying  "I  prefer  to  stay  sick,"  and 
that  guise  acts  as  a  permanent  and  hypnotic  Suggestion  to  keep 
things  in  statu  quo. 

So,  again,  the  first  use  of  our  formula  should  be  for  Sanity 
first.  There  is  no  man,  woman,  boy  or  girl,  without  a  range  of 
complexes  personal  to  each.  This  is  said  with  a  view  to  demon- 
strating that  uto  be  analyzed"  by  someone  claiming  the  ability 
to  do  so  is  quite  likely  to  fail  of  results  unless  you  yourself  are 
already  well  versed  in  psychology.  I  pity  the  wretches  who  will 
try  to  carry  out  the  habit  of  "shopping  around"  among  folks 
who  hang  out  shingles  as  "psychoanalysts,"  as  now  they  do 
among  less  effective  and  therefore  less  dangerous  quacks.  The 
ROOT  suggestion  of  the  race,  again  says:  "Thou  shalt  not  try 
to  evade  the  painful  necessity  of  thinking,"  and  running  to  an 
"analyst"  is  often  an  attempt  at  just  such  evasion.  Learn  also 
to  distinguish  between  thinking,  which,  to  justify  the  name 
should  be  analytical  and  constructive, — and  on  the  other  hand, 
mere  brooding  and  worrying.  The  latter  forms  are  attacking 
always,  and  actually  twisting  and  perverting  the  life  energies 
themselves. 

Do  consciously  and  wisely  what  you  have  been  doing 
habitually  and  ignorantly.  Subconsciously  or  habitually,— 
always  you  have  been  acting  according  to  the  law  of  Sugges- 
tion, or  if  we  wish  to  paraphrase  that,  then  according  to  the 
Law  of  Predominating  Mental  Impressions.  Such  impressions 
are  made  on  the  subconscious  when  for  a  second  or  for  an  hour 
you  have  fulfilled  the  three  conditions  enumerated.  Whenever 
the  pose  or  activity  of  your  body  has  not  occupied  the  mind; 
whenever  at  such  a  time  your  mind  itself  has  become  passive, 
and  then  when  this  physico-mental  condition  obtained,  you 
have  also  given  fixed  or  undivided  attention  to  something,— 
then  that  thing,  or  your  emotions  concerning  it,  have  become 
indelibly  impressed  in  your  subconscious  mind  as  dominators 
of  action  for  the  subconscious  energies. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  93 

All  these  conditions  may  have  occurred  a  thousand  times 
today,  in  situations  where  you  least  expected  that  they  would 
happen.  I  have,  on  looking  back  and  analyzing,  seen  where, 
automatically  and  without  volition,  the  entire  formula  has  been 
in  force  while  I  was  pursuing  a  fleeing  trolley  car.  Again 
I've  seen  it  occur  of  itself  with  less  distraction  at  a  concert; 
at  hearing  a  word  that  I  tried  to  place  and  thereby  became 
abstracted  for  a  moment;  in  viewing  a  sunset.  I've  heard  of  it 
occurring  this  way:  A  boy  mocked  his  rather  irascible  and 
stammering  grandfather,  who  wras  occupied  at  a  carpenter's 
bench  at  the  time.  The  boy  paid  no  attention  to  the  old  gentle- 
man's stuttering  warnings  that  he  would  be  punished  if  he  did 
not  desist.  The  boy,  studying  over  a  childish  drawing  of  a 
penciled  plan,  absent  mindedly,  or  thru  force  of  habit,  was 
again  aping  the  grandfather's  impeded  speech.  Out  of  patience 
then,  and  without  further  warning,  the  old  man  dealt  the  boy  a 
light  and  sudden  blow  on  the  back,  exclaiming  loudly,  uYou  will 
stammer,  will  you?"  And  the  boy  did  stammer  for  months 
thereafter.  He  had  fulfilled  the  three  requirements  of  the 
formula;  the  older  man,  if  the  story  is  true  (and  there  is  no 
reason  why  it  should  not  be),  had  merely  furnished  the  object 
for  the  camera  moment  of  the  fixed  attention  to  photograph. 

Throughout  most  of  life,  people  submit  to  doing  and 
thinking  automatically,  according  to  "habit  complexes."  It  is 
so  easy  to  do  things  according  to  habit,  which  we  glorify  by 
calling  our  "nature."  This  is  wrong.  It  leads  to  worse  than 
nowhere.  These  habits  for  the  most  part  were  formed  un- 
consciously under  circumstances  which  do  not  now  obtain. 
From  the  standpoint  of  true  progress,  there  is  no  mental  habit 
adequate  for  this  day's  or  this  moment's  endeavor.  Habit 
and  stagnation,  incompetence — are  psychological  synonyms. 
Do  not  throw  your  present  problem  down  to  your  habit  mind 
for  solution.  Solve  it  by  thought.  See  that  the  kind  of  thought 
you  use  comprehends  things  as  they  are,  not  as  the  colored 
spectacles  of  habit  would  twist  them.  Solve  the  new  impres- 
sion, the  new  experience,  the  new  difficulty — by  thought,  not 
by  habit.  Suspect  yourself  if  you  cannot  think  it  out.  En- 
courage yourself  if  wise  clews  result  from  thinking;  that  means 
you  are  getting  away  from  the  subconscious  tendency  to  stow 
away  the  kernel  of  experience  in  a  pickle  solution  of  futile 
phantasies. 


94  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

That  formula  given  in  this  chapter  is  meant  to  enable  you 
to  produce  at  will  the  "camera  moment"  which  automatically 
is  a  mechanism  in  your  mental  life.  If  you  practice  the  form- 
ula, you  will  have  many  of  such  camera,  or  fixation  of  attention 
moments.  You  may  never  notice  having  one.  That  does  not 
matter,  because  noticing  is  an  objective  function,  and  the  fixa- 
tion moment  is  an  act  of  the  subconscious.  Objectively  you 
can  only  furnish  the  required  ingredients  of  the  formula.  In 
anticipation  of  such  fixation  moments,  whenever  and  wherever 
they  may  occur,  have  ready  the  standing  Demand  for  greater 
and  keener  powers  of  conscious  thought.  Have  ready  a  deep- 
rooted  determination  to  get  away  from  viewing  and  solving 
things  by  a  play  on  your  own  emotions,  convictions  and  ideals 
to  the  extent  that  your  life  shows  so  far  such  have  been  in- 
adequate. 

A  BIT  OF  USELESS  (?)  SPECULATION 

He  who  dominates  the  subconscious  mind  in  line  with 
reality  needs  thereafter  but  to  photograph  on  it  what  he  will. 

The  counter-claims  of  conflicting  desires  not  being  there  to 
obscure  the  picture, — the  creative  forces  bent  without  dissipa- 
tion or  deploy  to  the  end  of  vitalizing  the  imprint — that  and 
nothing  more — then  a  tremendous  effect  at  once  is  produced  on 
physical  matter  thru  its  phase  of  entelechy — the  ether. 

Instantaneous  healing  may  be  the  item  pictured,  the  appor- 
tation  of  matter  thru  matter,  the  miraculous  growth  of  a  fruit- 
bearing  tree,  the  magical  creation  of  loaves  and  fishes,  the  walk- 
ing on  water  or  in  air,  the  seeing  and  comprehending  of  inner, 
psychic  and  spiritual  realms  of  nature,  the  making  of  man  a 
magi,  adept,  or  "god." 


In  TRUTH  nothing  is  impossible. 

We  are,  however,  but  learning  the  truth,  despite  our  pious 
claims  that  we  already  have  it. 

Psychology  but  hopes  to  help  in  this  learning,  and  that  is  all. 


LESSON  VI. 

SUBJECTIVE  INSIGHT  AND  OBJECTIVE 

ACCOMPLISHMENT;  or,  DREAM 

AND  REALITY 

WHEN  airplanes  were  first  invented,  we  read  much 
about  how  the  air  seems  to  move  in  strata  or  layers. 
Up  to  an  altitude  of  say,  500  feet,  the  movement 
of  air  or  wind  might  be  in  an  easterly  direction;  then  the  next 
500  or  1,000  feet  would  probably  be  found  comparatively 
quiet,  without  any  motion;  yet,  if  the  ascent  were  continued, 
the  aeronaut  would  as  likely  as  not  find  that  at  a  still  greater 
altitude  a  veritable  gale  was  blowing  in  a  westerly  direction, 
directly  opposite  to  the  wind  direction  of  the  lowest  air-layer. 

Now,  the  analogy  or  similarity  is  beautiful.  Psychology 
draws  attention  again  and  again  to  the  fact  that  movements 
or  activities  of  consciousness  are  also  in  layers. 

You  may  be  occupied  with  your  normal  current  activities. 
Yet  suddenly,  if  you  stop  for  a  moment,  you  will  note  that 
underneath  this,  another  substratum  of  more  or  less  discon- 
nected thought  has  been  "moving"  in  you  all  that  time.  This 
substratum  may  not,  and  as  a  rule  is  not,  in  any  apparent  way 
connected  with  the  duty  of  the  moment.  This  undertone  of 
thinking  is  not  objective  as  we  see,  and  yet  it  is  without  diffi- 
culty perceived,  if  one  takes  the  trouble  to  stop  the  strictly 
objective  operations  of  mind.  Hence  it  is  not  strictly  sub- 
conscious; or  as  the  later  schools  of  analytical  psychology 
would  say,  it  does  not  out  and  out  belong  in  the  cryptic  or 
obscure  realms  of  the  "unconscious." 

A  HIGHLY  IMPORTANT  "CROSSROADS"  OF  CONSCIOUSNESS 

We  will  therefore  call  this  middle  stratum  of  thinking,  the 
"subjective"  phase  of  mind.  It  is  a  sort  of  dream  obligato  to 
the  solo  of  objective  or  initiative  activity.  To  continue  the 
musical  analogy, — we  know  that  "middle  C"  is  the  property 
neither  of  the  base  nor  of  the  treble  clef;  and  yet  it  is  the 
property  of  both.  So  with  the  subjective  phase  of  thinking,— 

95 


96  PSYCHOLOGY'— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

it  is  neither  objective  nor  subconscious,  and  yet  is  a  strategic 
something,  "belonging1'  to  both.  It  is  the  "sitting  on  the 
fence"  phase  of  mind.  It  seems  lazily  to  refuse  co-operation 
with  either  the  field  on  one  side  or  the  field  on  the  other.  If 
we  suddenly  turn  the  searchlight  of  curiosity  on  him,  for  a 
few  moments,  we  may  observe  him,  but  the  light  is  too  much. 
The  subjective  current  of  thought  then  either  merges  into 
some  phase  of  the  objective  thought,  or  disappears  into  the 
hidden  field  of  the  subconscious.  As  soon  as  the  searchlight 
of  attention  is  withdrawn,  he  begins  slowly  to  resume  his  day- 
dream seat  on  the  fence. 

Again  this  subjective  phase  is  like  the  middle  layer  of 
comparatively  quiescent  air  between  two  active  and  moving 
strata.  In  the  normal  individual,  so  quiet  and  unobtrusive 
is  its  function,  that  it  hardly  does  to  call  its  activity  by  the 
name  of  "thinking."  We  might  call  it  by  that  rather  obscure 
word  "mentation,"  which  means  merely  an  "act  of  mind," 
without  particularizing  about  the  kind  of  act. 

Its  action  is  easily  observed  in  children.  This  is  especially 
noticeable  at  such  times  as  when  we  say  of  the  child  that  it 
is  "absorbed"  in  playing.  The  child  then  is  not  in  its  strictly 
objective  phase;  the  environment  is  ignored  except  for  the 
small  fraction  of  it  that  can  be  drawn  in  appropriately  to 
furnish  ingredients  in  the  phantasy  evoked  by  the  game.  The 
child,  strictly  speaking,  is  not  awake  to  its  surroundings.  Yet 
it  is  not  asleep.  It  is  in  a  state  of  wakefulness,  asleep  to  a 
(for  the  time  being)  repudiated  portion  of  consciousness. 

The  position  of  the  subjective  phase  of  consciousness  is 
between  the  waking  objective  and  the  sleeping  or  subcon- 
scious state.  Understanding  this,  many  students  are  able  to 
study  its  activities  until  drowsiness  becomes  so  insistent  that 
it  is  prudent  to  resume  full  wakefulness  in  order  that  the 
impressions  gained  may  not  be  lost  to  memory. 

In  watching  the  activities  of  this  subjective  phase, — and 
they  can  easily  be  watched,  if  one  only  has  the  persistence,— 
it  seems  as  tho'  the  actions  there  prevalent  could  never  be 
brought  under  volitional  control.  The  pictures  which  arise 
in  it;  the  thoughts  or  shadows  of  thoughts,  the  emotions  -  or 
ghosts  of  emotions,  all  flit  in  and  out,  to  and  fro,  apparently 
with  no  correlation.  Objectively  the  mind  may  be  occupied 
in  solving  a  problem  in  arithmetic;  in  the  same  instant,  by  a 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  97 

flash  of  attention,  by  a  flash  of  withdrawal  from  that  prob- 
lem,— one  will  see  that  subjectively  one  is  attending  again  a 
tea-party  or  a  political  discussion  that  happened  in  reality  ten 
years  ago.  Objectively  the  maiden  is  practicing  her  piano 
lesson;  subjectively,  she  is  brooding  over  what  she  should  have 
said  in  the  parting  by  moonlight  the  other  evening. 

Deeper  still,  in  the  utterly  subconscious  mind  of  mystery 
and  magical  ability,  other  activities  are  being  carried  on  at 
the  same  time.  That  deeper  phase  is  not  now  under  discus- 
sion, however.  We  are  concerned  only  with  that  middle  layer, 
the  subjective,  the  seemingly  capricious  and  elusive  plane  of 
mentation  that  only  with  difficulty  can  be  defined  into  thought. 

Is  the  function  of  this  field  of  consciousness  only  as  impor- 
tant as  its  conspicuousness,  or  rather  its  lack  of  conspicuous- 
ness?  I  rather  think  that  by  this  time  we  are  convinced  that 
nothing  in  the  psychic  make-up  of  man  can  be  safely  ignored. 
We  shall  try,  therefore,  to  find  what  can  be  known  of  the  sub- 
jective phase, — the  middle  ground  between  the  two  grand 
divisions  in  consciousness. 

Let  us  have  it  this  way.  We  have  two  adjoining  rooms 
connected  by  a  door.  Again,  we  will  see  in  our  two  rooms 
a  faithful  representation  of  the  factory  simile,  drawn  in  a 
previous  chapter.  Now  imagine  that  door  as  a  mirror  on  both 
sides.  It  is  reflecting  all  the  essences  of  the  automatic  habit 
complexes,  all  the  primitive,  introversional  and  selfish  phases 
of  the  subconscious  on  one  side,  and  on  the  other  side  it  is 
reflecting  the  precipitations  cast  upon  it  by  the  objective 
thoughts  and  endeavors  of  personality.  The  attention,  when 
directed  toward  that  door  which  we  have  been  calling  the  sub- 
jective phase  of  mind,  sees  both  sides  of  the  door  at  once. 
Hence  the  fragmentary  and  contradictory  nature  of  all  that 
flits  so  rapidly  and  so  capriciously  thru  our.  perceptions  when 
we  watch  it.  It  seems  meaningless. 

ITS  FUNCTION  IN  DREAMS 

Yet  a  door  is  a  door;  that  is  to  say,  this  phase  of  mind 
has  an  exceedingly  important  function.  If  one  could  examine 
it  with  something  like  a  spiritual  microscope,  undoubtedly  in 
its  very  texture  one  would  find  the  quintessence  of  the  entire 
being,  plus  a  "censorship"  principle  that  prevents  too  great 
an  uprush  from  the  subconsciousness.  In  dreams,  one  would 


98  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

find  that  door  practically  entitized  into  rather  an  intelligent 
and  very  powerful  censor.  One  would  find  that  the  representa- 
tions of  raw  passional  desires  from  the  subconscious  must  dis- 
guise themselves  very  cleverly  indeed  in  order,  as  dreams,  to 
reach  any  department  where  a  record  might  later  be  made  of 
them  by  the  objective  phase.  One  would,  on  closer  examina- 
tion, ascertain  that  no  dream  has  yet  been  dreamed  without 
such  censorship  or  "retouching"  by  this  censorious  door,  or 
this  door-like  censor.  And  yet,  one  would  also  find  that  like 
with  every  phase  of  mind,  even  its  censorship  had  a  "tone" 
entirely  in  line  with  the  fundamental  character  of  the  dreamer. 
Some  people  have  much  coarser  dreams  than  others.  The 
subconscious  content  is  no  "worse"  than  in  any  other  human 
being.  The  censor  has  been  trained  to  a  stricter  puritanism, 
that  is  all.  This  is  mentioned  merely  to  provoke  profitable 
thought  in  regard  to  other  departments  of  character.  For 
instance,  the  refinement  and  severity  of  the  censorlike  activities 
of  the  subjective  phase  may  be  pronounced  as  to  sexual  con- 
tents, while  in  regard  to  real  morality  it  may  be  utterly  deficient. 
Unselfishness,  willingness  and  ability  to  serve,  of  course,  are 
the  only  real  morality.  At  present  that  is  only  an  ideal  concept 
with  humanity,  with  which  the  objective  activities  are  endeavor- 
ing to  conform.  The  subconscious,  tho'  possessed  of  practically 
infinite  resources,  is  also  the  residuary  of  all  that  the  race  mind 
and  the  individual  mind  has  traversed  in  the  process  called 
life.  It  is  neither  moral  nor  immoral.  It  is  dominated  by 
the  greeds,  the  lusts,  the  passions  of  the  savage,  the  psychic 
phases  of  which  items  were  again  epitomized  in  the  personal 
infancy  and  childhood,  no  less  than  it  is  influenced  by  your 
aims  and  efforts  of  the  present  day.  "Thus,"  says  Isador  H. 
Coriat,  in  his  book,  "The  Meaning  of  Dreams,"  "the  uncon- 
scious contains  not  only  recent  experiences,  but  likewise  impres- 
sions of  infantile  childhood  life,  all  of  which  are  actively  and 
dynamically  functioning  like  conscious  processes.  The  uncon- 
scious is  therefore  the  great  repository  of  our  mental  life;  in 
it  are  contained  thoughts  and  wishes  which  may  be  foreign  to 
our  personality,  to  our  moral  or  ethical  nature,  thoughts  which 
we  constantly  and  apparently  successfully  repress,  but  which 
inadvertently  to  our  surprise  suddenly  crop  out  as  symptomatic 
actions,  psychoneurotic  symptoms,  or  dreams.  All  functional 
nervous  disturbances,  dreams,  and  slips  of  the  pen  or  tongue 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  99 

are  motivated  by  unconscious  mental  processes,  of  which  they 
are  the  symbolic  expression.  The  unconscious  (in  one  sense) 
is  a  kind  of  limbo  of  seemingly  forgotten  groups  of  thoughts  or 
complexes,  which  are  constanty  striving  to  reach  consciousness 
and  are  just  as  persistently  rejected  by  the  repressive  action 
of  the  censor.  But  frequently  the  censor  nods  and  is  caught 
unawares,  the  repressed  wish  slips  through  in  the  form  of  a 
dream,  and  we  are  repeatedly  surprised  to  discover  how  prim- 
itive, how  selfish  and  savage,  may  be  our  unconscious  desires." 
And  further,  "this  repression  of  emotions  at  the  same  time 
admits  their  reality  by  trying  to  avoid  and  negate  them.  The 
effort  of  these  repressed  emotions  to  find  an  outlet  leads  to 
all  forms  of  nervous  invalidism  such  as  so-called  nervous  pros- 
tration and  various  types  of  morbid  fears.  Such  individuals 
externally  appear  cold  and  austere,  apparently  emotionless, 
and  lacking  all  essentials  of  human  feeling,  yet  their  dreams 
show  various  degrees  of  forbidden  desires  which  only  in  this 
manner  come  to  expression.  Conditions  like  these  teach  us 
that  we  are  all  emotional  volcanoes,  and  when  we  pride  ourr 
selves  on  having  subdued  our  emotions  and  on  not  yielding 
to  so-called  vulgar  feelings  and  temptations,  nevertheless,  it 
is  certain  that,  hidden  within  the  depths  of  our  unconscious, 
these  repressed  desires  are  as  potent  and  active  as  though  they 
assailed  every  second  of  our  conscious  thinking." 

ITS  FUNCTION  IN  REGARD  TO  ABILITY 

We  see  here,  that  under  the  guise  of  reflector  for  the 
flitting  shadows  of  two  sides  of  consciousness,  the  subjective 
or  "middle  layer"  has  one  .very  important  function.  It  is  the 
phase  in  which  resides  the  censor.  It  stands  to  reason  that 
the  individual  method  of  censorship,  no  less  than  the  innate 
method  of  phantasy-building  formerly  discussed,  will  often 
keep  out  of  the  objective  chambers  such  features  of  ability 
as  are  closely  tied  up  in  mind  with  one  or  another  suppression. 
Thus,  a  citation  comes  to  mind  of  a  boy,  brilliant  in  his  school 
studies  with  one  exception,  namely  the  study  of  mathematics. 
He  dreads  the  mention  of  arithmetic  and  of  numbers.  Careful 
analysis  discloses  that  subconsciously  the  boy  hates  his  father, 
tho'  consciously  he  would  not  admit  even  to  himself  that  such 
was  the  case.  The  father  has  reiterated  to  the  child  many 
times  that  it  was  imbecility  to  pursue  other  studies  without  a 


100  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

basic  mathematical  grounding.  The  brilliancy  in  other  studies 
represents  how  strongly  the  subconscious  energies  unite  to  dis- 
prove the  elder's  opinions. 

With  every  unreasoned  destructive  emotion,  it  may  be 
active  as  in  fear  or  worry,  or  passive  as  in  long  indulged  hate 
or  envy,  we  shut  ourselves  out  from  some  valuable  department 
of  our  own  abilities.  It  may  be  worry  over  material  welfare, 
or  the  egotistical  brooding  over  what  "my  own  life"  has  been, 
is,  or  is  to  be;  that  does  not  matter  in  the  least  insofar  as  the 
same  destructive  result  is  concerned. 

All  the  fruits  of  education  are  the  results  of  co-operation 
between  the  subconscious  and  objective  phases  of  mind.  Take 
the  lawyer,  for  instance.  For  a  matter  of  three  to  five  years 
he  directs  his  attention  to  the  matter  of  laws  and  ordinances. 
He  views  things  more  or  less  as  the  tuition  proceeds,  thru 
legal  spectacles.  Psychologically,  he  is  converting  the  censor, 
however,  to  allow  more  of  the  subconscious  resources  that  are 
appropriate  to  this  branch  of  human  activity  to  well  up  from 
within.  The  censor  phase  in  the  early  months  of  the  schooling 
acts  like  a  restless  needle  in  a  cheap  compass.  It  quivers  and 
passes  the  mark  of  the  true  north  many  thousands  of  times  a 
day,  regardless  of  how  sincere  the  effort  of  the  beginner. 
Once  in  a  while,  for  moments  or  hours  at  a  time,  the  novice 
feels  that  he  has  an  intuitional  grasp  of  the  entire  subject,— 
that  he  sees  the  theory  of  the  entire  system  of  jurisprudence 
so  vividly,  that  now  nothing  remains  to  be  done  but  to  fill  in 
the  details.  Then  this  "perspective"  vanishes  quite  unaccount- 
ably, to  stay  away  maybe  for  days.  Yet  the  constant  effort  of 
the  volition  to  enlist  the  attention  is  kept  up,  and  parallel  with 
this  effort  more  and  more  do  the  moments  and  hours  of  "intui- 
tional grasp"  come  over  the  student.  Psychologically,  this 
means  that  concurrently  with  the  objective  accumulation  of 
facts,  more  and  more  was  the  censor  trained  to  "release"  the 
subconscious  energies  and  resources  compatible  with  the  sub- 
ject. The  watchman,  the  capricious,  censorious,  subjective 
"middle-mind"  was  itself  "bent,"  in  the  process,  itself  was 
educated  to  hold  a  more  liberal  view  toward  formerly  sup- 
pressed "complexes,"  which  it  began  now  to  release  generously, 
provided  such  had  any  bearing  on  the  success  or  failure  of 
the  endeavor.  Then  comes  a  day  when  the  lawyer  is  "admitted 
to  the  bar."  If  that  means  that  he  has  truly  mastered  his  sub- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  ANJJ  ESSFNIYAL  J01 

ject  for  permanency,  the  moment  when  that  permanent  mastery 
began,  marked  the  point  at  which  the  action  of  the  censor,  at 
least  in  one  department  of  the  mind,  was  changed  from  sup- 
pression to  TRANSFORMATION. 

Failure  is  self  suppression.  But  success  is  not  "letting 
go"  of  one's  suppressions.  Success  is  TRANSFORMATION  of 
subconscious  energies  otherwise  made  to  run  in  hidden,  vicious 
and  morbid  circles.  If  one  were  to  ulet  go"  of  the  suppressed 
complexes  clothed  in  the  raw  and  chaotic  savage  and  childish 
phantasies  they  subconsciously  dwell  in,  it  would  not  be  only 
failure,  but  insanity  as  well. 

Objectively  we  must  contrive  mechanisms  to  aid  just  those 
projects  or  objects,  in  regard  to  which  we  may  be  making 
demands  on  the  subconscious.  The  successful  student,  whether 
of  psychology  or  of  music  or  of  engine-construction  does  that. 
The  young  lady  using  the  formula  explained  in  a  prior  chap- 
ter, would  be  foolish  to  idealize  herself  during  a  "camera 
moment"  as  a  skilled  singer,  if  at  the  same  time  she  were  not 
taking  music  lessons  in  the  prosaic  and  everyday  fashion. 
Energies  if  released,  as  they  are  likely  to  be  during  the  psy- 
chological exercise,  would  have  to  work  out  in  some  other  way 
than  music,  if  she  were  not  training  objectively  and  physically 
for  that  purpose.  Whatever  she  did  other  than  music  with 
the  sudden  overplus  of  (then)  refined  energy,  she  would  have 
a  tendency  to  repeat.  The  habit  mind,  that  is  to  say  the  sub- 
conscious and  subjective  combined,  would  pounce  upon  what- 
ever was  done  as  a  substitute  for  the  music,  and  a  "split"  atti- 
tude toward  music  would  result.  The  attitude  of  "It  is  the  ONE 
BIG  THING  to  do,"  would  be  gone,  and  the  student  would  be 
now  equally  sincere  in  voicing  the  more  common  "After  all, 
true  proficiency  is  not  for  me,"-  -"Is  it  worth  while,  consider- 
ing the  effort?" — and  "What  is  the  use?" 

EDUCATION 

Psychologically  we  may  brazenly  enumerate  the  names  of 
all  the  world  geniuses  as  perfect  (more  or  less)  examples  of 
co-operation  between  the  subconscious  and  objective  depart- 
ments of  mind.  Education  achieves  the  same  object, — in  part. 
In  instances  of  genius  the  same  process  has  been  more  com- 
plete. Acute  neuroses  or  so-called  manias  again  represent  re- 
sults of  the  same  process,  but  instead  of  the  energies  vitalizing 


102  -PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

some  mechanism  having  to  do  with  recognized  reality,  the 
vitalizing  has  been  played  upon,  and  made  to  inflate  some 
phantasy  personal  to  the  sufferer. 

In  applied  psychology  various  attempts  have  been  made 
to  incorporate  certain  physical  and  mental  features  in  a  mode 
of  concentration  that  would  epitomize  in  miniature  that  entire 
process  for  specific  ends  which  the  student  would  wish  to  achieve. 
The  formula  given  is  such  an  attempt,  and  where  sanely  prac- 
ticed while  objectively  the  student  is  intelligently  learning  all 
he  can  from  comparative  and  contemporary  presentations  of 
•the  subject  herein  taught,  we  believe  that  in  six  months  it  will 
do  as  much  as  six  years  in  the  average  school  would  do.  We 
do  not  mean  that  it  can  be  used  as  a  substitute  for  the  accepted 
.  forms  of  education.  We  do  mean  this :  The  word  education 
itself  is  the  noun  form  of  the  verb  "educe" — "to  draw  out." 
To  draw  out  of  where?  From  the  inner  accumulations  and 
resources  both  of  energy  and  knowledge — the  subconscious  or 
subliminal.  Our  accepted  usages,  customs,  forms,  conven- 
tions, amenities  and  ethics,  all  that  combined  we  call  our  civ- 
ilization, demand  that  the  educing  be  done  along  certain  lines, 
but  slightly  varying  decade  to  decade.  That  probably  is  as  it 
should  be.  We  do  mean,  that  education  often  leaves  untouched 
the  only  ways  and  means  by  which  the  student  might  hope  to 
realize  some  helpful  and  unique  station  in  life,  to  achieve  some 
form  of  perfection  peculiar  and  personal  to  himself.  Con- 
ventional education,  no  matter  how  well  thought  out,  will  never 
be  able  to  do  for  people  what  a  good  sound  drill  in  self-study 
or  psychology  can  do  in  such  regards.  And,  moreover,  psy- 
chology is  best  studied  as  a  matter  of  self-induction  and  self- 
devisement  after  a  number  of  years  have  been  spent  in  life 
away  from  school.  The  "mysteries"  in  classical  times,  were 
not  entered  until  the  decade  that  signified  middle  age  was 
already  passed.  However,  we  can  see  no  harm  in  getting  this 
"second  sighting"  as  a  gunner  might  say,  at  any  time  after 
experience  at  self  directing  has  been  undergone. 

And  yet,  in  some  exceptional  instances,  the  subconscious 
movements  and  resources  of  mind  seem  to  have  been  all  suffi- 
cient to  furnish  a  perfect  substitute  for  education.  Such  was 
the  case  of  Joan  of  Arc  from  a  strictly  psychological  angle,— 
although  again  such  a  magnificent  instance  is  left  open  for 
other  and  perhaps  greater  disclosures  as  time  advances. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  103 

Andrew  Jackson  Davis  was,  if  some  reports  of  his  early  life 
may  be  believed,  mentally  dense  and  incapable  of  response  to 
the  schooling  he  was  expected  to  undergo.  His  rather  read- 
able and  phantastic  expose  of  transcendentalism  can  be  well 
compared  with  the  effort  of  a  man  fairly  well  educated.  His 
subconscious  faculties  were  aroused  thru  the  efforts  of  a  mes- 
merist. Then,  as  we  had  it  in  our  previous  book,  "Psychology 
Made  Practical," — the  case  of  Blind  Tom  has  been  rather 
incompletely  handled  by  the  rigidly  limited  theories  of 
academic  psychologists.  "Here  is  the  blind  negro  boy,  Blind 
Tom,  basking  day  in  and  day  out  on  the  front  porch  of  the 
landowner's  house.  Within,  the  daughter  of  the  householder, 
an  advanced  musical  student,  is  incessantly  practicing  at  the 
pianoforte.  Suddenly,  when  opportunity  offers,  the  colored 
boy  sits  down  and  demonstrates  that  he  can  play,  and  play 
well,  not  only  everything  his  unknowing  teacher  (the  land- 
owner's daughter)  had  ever  played  in  his  hearing,  but  that 
he  is  able  to  execute  without  flaw  anything  that  anybody,  includ- 
ing a  skeptical  world-known  virtuoso  or  two,  plays  before  him. 
Unconscious  cerebration?  Clear  as  mud,  if  taken  as  an  all- 
explanatory  theory;  although  'unconscious  cerebration'  pos- 
sibly constitutes  a  necessary  part  of  the  physical  mechanism 
employed  by  the  subconscious  mind  in  carrying  out  its  orders. 
Perfect  suggestibility  then?  Yes.  Now  let  us  strive  to  under- 
stand what  all  this  implies.  Whence  Blind  Tom's  technique? 
Whence  the  finger  dexterity?  Blind  Tom's  playing  was  with- 
out mistakes,  we  hear,  but  we  have  heard  the  foolish  criticism 
that  his  fingering  and  technique  were  more  crude  than  Pad- 
ereweski's.  Sit  down  at  the  piano,  if  you  have  NEVER  SEEN  A 
PIANO  (as  Blind  Tom  had  not) ,  and  try  a  very  simple  thing- 
say  'Chop-Sticks  Waltz.'  You  will  find  that  normally  five 
or  six  days  of  finger  drill  will  be  necessary  to  play  this  trifling 
inanity  CRUDELY." 

"If  we  will  remember  that  a  suggestion  once  accepted  as 
an  order  by  the  subconscious  mind  is  worked  out  to  its  logical 
conclusion;  then  if  we  will  pay  more  attention  to  this  'logical 
conclusion'  dictum,  as  it  would  apply  in  a  case  of  this  kind, 
we  will  gain  new  light.  The  undeniable  will  dawn  upon  us 
that,  given  favorable  or  perfect  conditions,  ithe  subconscious 
faculties  will  work  to  develop  the  necessary  physical  media  for 


104  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

expressing  and  externalizing  results  of  a  suggestion  well  im- 
planted and  reinforced  thru  accepted  reiterations." 

We  must  remember  also,  that  Blind  Tom  was  psychically 
a  child  to  the  end  of  his  days.  A  child  is  impressionable.  That 
is  to  say,  he  is  in  the  dream  or  semi-objective  phase  of  mind. 
If  he  can  be  fully  enlisted  in  any  pursuit  while  still  in  that 
state  of  mind,  you  have  him  then  enlisted  censorship  and  all. 
You  have  no  complex  to  vitiate  and  deploy  the  energies;  all 
of  the  subconscious  resources  can  then  be  used  in  vitalizing 
and  making  real  the  blue-print  being  implanted  deeper  and 
yet  deeper  during  the  long  successions  of  "camera  moments." 

CONCENTRATION 

In  the  normal  adult,  much  experience  has  been  stored 
away  in  the  subconscious.  This  experience,  as  shown,  is 
wrapped  in  phantasy,  in  self-flattery  or  in  self-defense,  or  in 
suppression.  These  all  have  a  tendency  to  draw  the  new 
vision,  the  new  ideal  or  the  new  mental  pursuit  down  to  their 
own  level,  or  to  repudiate  it  if  it  does  not  in  anywise  conform 
to  them.  Hence  what  the  child  can  do  negatively,  the  adult 
must  do  positively.  Where  Blind  Tom  could  lie  down  and 
drink  in  his  life's  ability  negatively, — the  adult  must  concen- 
trate his  mind  and  make  consecutive  and  systematic  endeavors. 
\  The  child  has  not  the  resistances :  the  adult  has,  but  can  over- 
come them. 

Concentration  of  mind  is  necessary.  Concentration  is  not 
difficult.  It  is  easy.  Worrying  that  "nobody  loves  us,"  and 
that  we  may  die  in  the  poorhouse,  are  perfect  examples  of  con- 
centration. Most  people  do  it  superbly  well  without  any  tui- 
tion and  without  hours  spent  in  practice.  Psychologically,  con- 
centration is  no  more  and  no  less  than  paying  attention.  If 
you  would  learn  mental  concentration,  learn  to  manipulate  and 
direct  your  own  attention,  instead  of  allowing  those  fragments 
of  your  "complexes"  which  evade  or  are  passed  by  the  censor, 
to  guide  and  misguide  it  for  you.  Don't  fight  the  complexes; 
furnish  a  mechanism,  and  currently  go  on  completing  and  per- 
fecting your  mechanism,  as  we  saw  the  law  student  do.  When 
writing  a  letter,  complete  a  subject  before  jumping  to.  another. 
I  That  does  not  mean  that  your  letters  should  be  wordy.  When 
reading  a  paragraph,  determine  to  understand  it;  if  it  is  not 
understandable,  something  is  the  matter  either  with  the  writer 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  105 

or  with  yourself.  What  is  the  matter?  When  thinking1 'a 
thought,  think  intelligently.  It  is  not  necessary  to  come  to  a 
final  judgment  and  to  "set"  an  opinion  on  each  subject  that 
enters  the  mind.  A  thought  should  come  to  some  conclusion, 
but  in  the  interests  of  sanity,  why  not  let  that  conclusion  be 
that  up  to  the  present  time  you  have  not  enough  evidence  and 
data  at  hand  to  warrant  a  conviction?  Yet  think  in  a  certain 
instead  of  in  an  uncertain  way.  These  are  intensely  more 
effective  ways  of  developing  mental  concentration,  than  the 
weird  concoctions  of  ink-spot  gazing,  crystal  gazing,  punk 
burning,  etc.,  sometimes  handed  out  by  would-be  teachers  as 
infallible  "formulas." 

When  you  have  trained  a  while  in  enlisting  your  attention 
to  obey  your  will,  then  start  in  on  the  re-education  of  your 
subjective  phase  of  mind, — preferably  while  practicing  the 
formula,  but  alert  at  other  times  to  the  value  of  playing  a 

Current  COUNTER  CENSORSHIP  YOURSELF  IN  THE  INTEREST  OF 
YOUR  PRESENT  IDEALS. 

Do  You  EVER  "BROOD?"— THEN 
MAKE  YOUR  BROODING  PAY 

Aside  from  being  capricious  and  elusive,  the  subjective  tir 
middle  layer  of  consciousness  is  also  the  "brooding"  phase 
of  mind.  Learn  to  brood  constructively.  Learn  to  brood 
cheerfully  and  definitely  and  with  certainty.  Learn  to  brood 
over  realities  instead  of  in  your  own  phantasies,  likes,  dis- 
likes, past  injuries,  anticipated  troubles,  and  what  not.  The 
brooding  phase  is  the  subjective — the  watchman  from  whom 
the  great  magical  subconscious  gets  its  working  orders.  Learn 
to  brood  constructively  and  attentively,  that  is,  with  the  atten- 
tion directed  to  the  object  or  condition  you  most  need.  Don't 
lie  to  yourself  that  you  already  have  it;  that  is  not  at  all 
necessary  in  the  first  place,  and  in  the  second  place,  it  is  doing 
just  the  thing  that  you  need  to  get  away  from — the  habit  of 
fiction  building,  which  dissipates  the  energies  of  the  subcon- 
scious. The  house  contractor  never  loses  sight  of  the  archi- 
tect's plan,  but  parallel  with  his  visualizing  of  the  blue-print, 
he  is  working  constructively  day  by  day  to  realize  it.  When 
the  foundation  is  barely  built,  he  does  not  waste  time  lying  to 
himself  or  others  that  the  house  is  completed,  sold  and 
occupied. 


106  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

RECONSTRUCTION 

In  brief,  the  reconstruction  of  some  part  of  one's  self  is 
the  work  that  mentally  all  of  us  are  doing,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  whether  we  want  to  and  believe  we  can,  or 
whether  we  disbelieve  it  and  don't  want  to.  The  part  under 
alteration  may  be  from  good  health  to  disorder  and  impair- 
ment, or  it  may  be  from  incapacity  to  health.  It  may  be  from 
mental  peace  to  chronic  anxiety,  or  it  may  be  from  this  sort 
of  neurosis  back  to  poise  and  buoyant  mental  efficiency.  It 
may  be  from  despondent  ineffectiveness  back  into  the  mild  and 
sane  aggression  that  spells  certainty  and  success. 

The  "middle"  layer  of  consciousness,  that  which  we  have 
called  the  "subjective"  is  the  place  where  most  of  this  is  deter- 
mined. Because  it  is  so 'easily  reached,  and  because  of  its 
valuable  position  in  relation  to  the  subconscious  resources  and 
energies,  it  is  the  "place"  in  which  to  try  as  much  definite 
thinking  along  these  lines  as  possible.  The  censor  resident 
there  will  of  course  remain  a  censor,  but  he  will  become  in 
that  wise  an  intelligent  official,  instead  of  the  sickness  and 
failure  producing  ignoramus  and  nuisance  which  usually  we 
.find  him  to  be.  The  capricious  phase  there  will  then  slowly 
begin  to  transform  into  the  constructive,  brooding  phase. 
There  will  be  less  flitting  to  and  fro  of  counter  motives, 
negativing  one  another  and  making  your  efforts  futile.  You 
will  slowly  become  a  unified  personality,  which  means  a  suc- 
cessful personality..  The  entire  subjective  phase  will  begin 
more  and  more  to  respond  to  the  dictates  of  the  attention. 
The  attention  itself  will  become  more  docile  to  your  will. 
Speaking  of  the  effect  of  the  mental  arrangement  on  the  phy- 
sical, Wm.  A.  White,  M.D.,  says  in  his  "Outlines  of  Psychia- 
try:" "Here  the  much  vexed  question  of  the  relation  of  mind 
to  body  is  touched  upon.  An  appeal  to  facts  would  show  that 
the  individual  reacts  to  his  milieu  by  the  development  of 
mechanisms  that  may  include  as  parts  the  crass  physical  at  one 
end,  the  refined  psychic  at  the  other.  In  these  experiments  of 
Pawlow  and  Cannon,  for  example,  mechanisms  were  created 
which  acted  as  a  whole.  Like  a  watch,  the  parts  were  so  inti- 
mately related  that  no  portion  could  be  set  in  motion  without 
setting  the  whole  going."  So  it  is  in  tuning  up  or  mastering 
any  fraction  of  consciousness, — such  as  the  subjective  tendency 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  107 

to  dream  and  abstraction.  Practice  to  make  it  conform  to 
\oiir  attention,  and  behold,  the  attention  itself  slowly  becomes 
more  docile  to  your  will. 

In  "sizing  up"  the  average  half-failure,  half-success,  no 
comment  fits  so  well  as  Bergson's:  "Doubtless  we  think  with 
only  a  small  part  of  our  past,  but  it  is  with  our  entire  past, 
including  the  original  bent  of  our  soul,  that  we  desire,  will 
and  act."  To  train  the  subjective  tendency  away  from  intro- 
version and  phantasy,  means  that  you  are  slowly  beginning  to 
enlist  the  co-operation  of  all  you  have  accumulated  in  the  past. 
It  is  a  fight  after  all  as  to  whether  you  will  (or  have  already) 
become  one  of  your  own  habits,  or  whether  you  will  whip 
all  your  habits  into  line  and  transform  them  into  willing  and 
able  co-operators  with  you. 

But  it  is  a  fight  in  name  only.  Its  technique  is  that  of 
re-educating  the  subjective  phase  now  pointed  out.  Some  day 
during  such  a  process  of  re-education,  probably  this  will  happen 
to  you :  probably  you  will  experience  one  of  those  common  and 
harmless  abstractions  of  a  moment  from  the  work,  study  or 
play  in  which  you  then  may  be  employed.  You  make  thou- 
sands of  such  visits  to  the  subjective  every  day.  But  some 
day,  in  one  such  visit,  instead  of  flittings  and  caprices  entirely 
foreign  to  your  life  as  you  used  to  experience  there  in  the  past, 
you  will  then  note  with  satisfaction  that  the  brooding  subjec- 
tive is  contentedly  ruminating  in  accordance  with  your  own 
avowed  projects  and  activities.  That  will  mean  that  you  have 
made  of  an  automatic  and  ignorant  censor  an  intelligent  one. 
You  will  have  won  over  to  you  a  co-operator  in  your  desire 
to  bring  your  habits  into  line.  The  "subjective  mentation" 
will  have  become  something  that  transforms,  alters,  and 
enthuses  your  subconscious  energies  from  "away-running" 
habits,  into  "with-you-running"  aids. 

In  instances  of  genius,  there  is  a  great  amount  of  such 
transforming,  but  it  is  often  exclusive;  that  is  to  say,  the  censor 
releases  so  generously  in  line  with  the  type  of  genius,  that  com- 
plexes and  other  ferments  of  thought  and  energy  not  in  line 
with  it,  are  released  but  little,  or  not  at  all.  Hence  a  genius  is 
often  a  neurotic. 

More  mildly,  gloom  and  the  blues,  are  likewise  such  fer- 


108  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

ments  of  unexpended  energy,  barred  from  expenditure  because 
they  seek  exit  in  dress  not  suitable  to  your  censor. 

The  fallacious  sense  of  inferiority  which  many  people 
feel,  diffidence,  shyness,  bashfulness,  even  the  often  lauded 
"esthetic"  poses,  to  the  extent  that  they  disguise  inefficiency- 
are  all  in  the  same  category,  but  each  would  require  lengthy 
analytical  disclosures  not  exactly  in  line  with  the  purposes  of 
this  book.  "The  way  out"  from  these  maladjustments  of  the 
psyche  is  practically  the  same  in  each  instance — it  will  always 
have  to  do  with  re-educating  and  readjusting  that  turnstile  of 
consciousness  which  in  this  chapter  we  are  calling  the  subjec- 
tive mind.  As  you  persist  in  taking  the  effort  on  your  own 
shoulders,  learn  in  this  endeavor  to  shield  yourself  less,  and 
to  pity  or  condemn  yourself  not  at  all.  The  results  will  then 
be  more  genuine  and  more  permanent.  Strength  after  all  must 
be  gained  of  one's  own-efforts. 

Failure,  disease,  poverty,  are  all  the  results  of  thought  in 
the  ways  shown.  They  have  no  existence  in  reality.  Remove 
their  cause  in  the  consciousness  if  you  would  be  rid  of  the  ef- 
fects. It  is  true  that  in  a  few  isolated  cases  one  may  find  con- 
ditions which  seem  stubbornly  to  refute  the  truth  of  this.  That 
means  that  man's  insight  is  not  in  those  channels  of  his  own 
consciousness  keen  and  deep  enough,  nor  his  faith  strong 
enough  to  disclose  and  dislodge  the  cause.  But  if  endeavors 
for  self  improvement  thru  applied  psychology  have  proven 
one  thing,  it  has  been  this :  that  of  all  the  ways  and  means  to 
that  end,  psychology  itself  in  comparison  has  been  the  most 
fruitful. 

GENERALIZATION 

Our  present  attempt  to  analyze  things  as  they  act  out  in 
the  lives  and  actions  of  persons,  is  called  analytical  psychology, 
or  psycho-analysis.  Its  literature  dates  back  only  to  1900. 
We  do  not  yet  fully  realize  its  importance  because  of  its  mag- 
nitude. Centuries  hence,  provided  there  are  no  cataclysms  to 
erase  our  civilization,  the  first  psycho-analysts,  such  as  Freud, 
Silberer,  Jung,  Ferenczi  and  others,  will  be  viewed  with  the 
same  respect  that  we  now  view  Esculapius,  Hippocrates,  Har- 
vey,— or  as  in  another  department  we  view  Bruno,  Gallileo 
and  Herschel. 

From  the  standpoint  of  Success  and  How  to  Achieve  It, 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  109 

this  field  of  study  is  of  infinitely  more  worth  than  the  findings 
of  a  psychic  research  society.  There  have  always  been  well 
authenticated  reports  of  psychic  or  so-called  "supernatural" 
happenings.  An  endeavor  framed  only  to  tabulate  things  of 
this  sort,  when  they  happen,  is  not  of  half  the  worth  as  a  sys- 
tematized and  progressive  endeavor  toward  the  end  that  we 
may  know  why  and  how  they  happen.  However,  the  work 
of  such  psychic  research  societies  may  be  called  the  tabulating 
or  recording  department  of  psychology. 

Then,  there  are  a  number  of  able  minds  throughout  the 
world  conducting  experiments  in  so-called  animal  magnetism; 
in  mediumship,  in  clairvoyance,  in  the  possibility  of  apporta- 
tion  of  material  objects,  etc.  This  might  be  called  the  ex- 
perimental department. 

To  balance  the  analytical  phase  at  one  end,  there  is  found 
the  synthetic  psychology  at  the  other.  It  is  concerned  mostly 
in  extracting  from  the  tabulating  and  records  of  experiments 
applicable  laws  of  mind,  which  the  person  bent  on  improving 
himself  may  grasp  and  use. 

Analysis  Synthesis 

Applied 

Recording  Psychology 

We  might  put  it  in  the  form  of  a  diagram,  merely  to  aid 
the  imagination.  It  looks  like  the  swinging  board  which  in 
childhood  days  we  called  the  "teeter-totter."  That's  what  it's 
meant  to  look  like.  A  teeter-totter  is  a  simple  form  of  ma- 
chine. That  is  the  conception  or  idea  that  we  want.  A  ma- 
chine produces  something,  or  is  supposed  to.  Some  machines 
produce  nothing  but  noise,  or  motion  that  is  lost  within  itself. 
Yet  every  machine  produces  something.  The  machine  as 
here  represented  is  meant  to  produce  what  is  known  as  "Ap- 
plied Psychology."  It  is  meant  to  produce  a  psychology  that 
each  and  every  one  of  us  can  apply  to  become  more  efficient; 
to  live  more  abundantly,  and  to  have  more  horse-sense. 
Recorded  fact  must  first  be  analyzed,  then  "put  together" 
again  for  the  purpose  of  deriving  a  working  knowledge  of 
the  thing  studied.  This  should  make  plain  the  inadequacy  of 
some  systems  of  applied  psychology,  "success  courses,"  etc., 


1 10  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

before  the  public,  which  as  a  matter  of  fact,  whatever  they  are 
—are  not  applied  psychology  at  all. 

Suggestion  is  the  law  of  the  mind.  Even  the  objective 
and  critical  phase  is  not  entirely  immune  to  its  influence.  All 
that  phase  of  being  now  described  as  the  subconscious,  the  sub- 
jective,— and  their  methods  of  expression  such  as  the  intelli- 
gent cell  activities,  the  action  of  the  semi-intelligent  vital 
energy, — all  that  goes  on  in  our  being  tho  we  be  not  aware 
of  it, — all  this  is  subject  to  the  power  of  suggestion.  Sugges- 
tion to  one's  self,  that  is  to  say,  to  one's  own  subconscious  mind, 
is  best  applied  in  accordance  with  the  formula  already  given. 
When  that  is  understood,  the  first  question  arising  in  the  stu- 
dent's mind  is,  "What  sort  of  impression  shall  I  implant  in  my 
subconscious?"  To  answer  that,  we  attempted  to  describe  the 
lack  of  sanity,  and  that  "sanity  first"  should  be  the  object.  The 
thoughtful  student  soon  sees  that  this  is  not  so  easy  as  it  ap- 
pears, inasmuch  as  the  "phantasy"  or  mental  conception  of 
what  sanity  and  success  are,  might  be  so  utterly  out  of  line  with 
either  the  "bent"  already  existing  in  the  subconscious,  or  with 
external  fact  itself,  that  stimulation  of  such  a  "bent"  by  so 
potent  a  tool  as  Suggestion  might  only  aggravate  whatever 
undesirable  condition  may  already  exist.  Hence  the  better 
part  of  the  formula-lesson  and  of  this,  is  concerned  with  ways 
of  dissipating,  or  rather,  ways  of  "transforming"  such  funda- 
mentally adverse  "bents"  into  constructive  mechanisms. 

CONCLUSION 

The  thoughtless  student  might  find  an  idea  developing 
within  him,  to  this  general  effect:  If  I  allow  my  habit  reposi- 
tory, or  my  subconscious  mind  to  become  too  wise  as  to  its  own 
laws,  it  will  be  a  keener  opponent  than  ever  to  my  real  ideals 
and  needs.  To  that,  if  it  were  articulate,  the  Subconscious 
itself  might  be  imagined  as  replying:  "I  am  after  all  yourself. 
I  possess  powers  of  which  you  dare  not  even  dream  as  yet;  I 
possess  lucidity  which  I  practice  even  now  in  ways  you  least 
suspect.  My  welfare  is  yours.  I  can  act,  I  do  act,  I  shall  con- 
tinue to  act.  I  know  no  fatigue.  But  I  am  entirely  limited  as 
to  the  effectiveness  of  my  actions  by  the  dimensions  of  your 
intelligence  and  faith.  If  your  faith  is  strong  and  blind,  I  work 
potently  to  bring  about  in  you  a  desire  for  knowledge.  I  may 
have  to  do  this  by  bringing  about  what  you  would  call  failure, 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  111 

the  insane  asylum,  or  other  calamities.  It  was  in  this  connec- 
tion that  I  was  speaking,  when  I  had  Phillips  Brooks  say: 
'The  noisy  waves  are  failures,  but  the  great  silent  tide  is  a 
success.  Do  you  know  what  it  is  to  be  failing  every  day  and 
yet  to  be  sure  that  your  life  is,  as  a  whole,  in  its  greatest  move- 
ment and  meaning,  not  failing  but  succeeding?'  If  your  faith 
is  intelligent,  that  is  good.  But  I  am  working  even  for  more 
than  that.  I  desire  that  you  reach  all  that  you  have  repudi- 
ated, forgotten,  and  stored  within  me, — to  face  these  things 
and  give  them  energetic,  intelligent  current  disposal  in  some  line 
of  thought  and  objective  action  benefiting  others  than  your- 
self. I  already  know  all  the  laws  which  mistakenly  you  thought 
you  should  hide  from  me,  but  it  is  your  place  not  mine,  to  apply 
those  laws.  I  await  your  suggestions.  Make  them  inclusive 
of  w7hat  intelligence  you  have  gleaned  from  experience  and 
study.  My  present  purpose  is  to  make  of  you,  (if  you  will  thus 
permit  me,  and  your  permission  must  be  in  the  form  of  positive, 
intelligent  suggestion)  not  only  a  healthy  individual  physically, 
but  to  bend  heaven  and  earth  that  your  ideal  of  a  complete  and 
successful  life  here  and  now  may  be  realized.  My  ultimate 
purpose  is  to  make  of  you  a  being  who  is  not  afraid  of  truth, 
a  being  who  has  at  his  finger  tips  every  secret  of  nature,  who 
controls  his  own  mind  and  environment  with  a  nod.  I  shall  not 
rest  until  my  powers  are  united  with  your  initiative  by  the 
elimination  of  selfish  content  with  which  you  have  thru  aeons 
burdened  me.  I  shall  chip,  hue  and  alter  until  you  stand  a 
never-dying,  passionate  and  powerful  god  among  other  gods 
on  high  Olympus." 


LESSON  VII. 

HOW  YOU  CAN  BEGIN  TO  "WORK 
MIRACLES" 

YOU,  as  personality,  are  the  working  out  of  your  own 
subconscious  accumulation.  Broadly,  that  accumula- 
tion consists  of  Suggestions,  which  according  to  your 
"bent"  you  have  derived  and  absorbed  from  mood,  dream, 
phantasy,  emotion,  thought,  speech,  conviction  and  action. 

Whenever  we  have  said  the  "law"  of  mind,  we  have 
used  the  word  law  by  way  of  euphemism,  for  no  one  yet  knows, 
much  less  applies  the  entire  law  of  mind.  But  one  active  and 
mighty  fraction  in  that  entire  law  is  covered  by  what  you  now 
know  of  Suggestion.  Suggestion  might  well  be  called  a 
"method"  of  mind. 

Whatever  enlists  the  attention  of  the  subconscious,  is  a 
Suggestion  and  acts  as  such. 

This  chapter  is  intended  to  help  the  student  in  outlining 
specific  ways  of  applying  this  method  or  law  of  Suggestion. 
Throughout  the  foregoing  it  was  intended  to  show  that  in  men- 
tal readjustment,  Suggestion  plays  a  major  part.  If  mental 
readjustment  is  fundamental  then  complete  physical  readjust- 
ment follows.  If  the  mind  is  well  proportioned  and  well 
poised,  so  will  the  body  be.  Suggestion  can  be  used  for  the 
cure  of  disease;  alterations  and  improvements  of  character; 
the  reclaiming  of  the  incorrigible,  and  bringing  the  sub-normal 
back  to  normal. 

A  suggestion  once  implanted  in  the  subconscious  mind, 
provided  it  is  not  contradicted  by  weightier  suggestions,  tends 
to  work  out  to  a  logical  conclusion  and  result.  If  the  Sug- 
gestion has  been  constructive,  as  for  instance,  a  demand  for 
health  or  added  capacity  for  knowledge,  then  this  logical  con- 
clusion will  show  forth  in  time  as  a  new  factor  in  the  character 
of  the  person;  as  a  sharpening  of  an  old  ability  or  the  addition 
of  a  new  one;  as  a  change  for  the  better  in  the  permanent 
health  of  the  individual,  etc.  There  is  an  irradiation  about 
the  working  out  of  all  such  acts  of  consciousness.  That  irradia- 
112 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  113 

tion  leaves  no  department  of  the  individual  untouched.  All 
his  "natures" — spiritual,  mental,  psychic,  emotional,  passional, 
physical, — receive  the  influence  and  subtly  partake  of  the  im- 
provement. 

To  the  degree  that  you've  given  fixed  attention  to  the 
statements  made  in  these  chapters,  to  that  extent  have  those 
very  ideas  been  absorbed  as  concepts  by  the  objective  mind, 
and  also  as  Suggestions  by  your  subconscious  mind. 

Your  subconscious  phase  always  had  perfect  machinery, 
psychic  and  physical,  with  which  to  make  you  "over"  in  a  short 
space  of  time.  It  was  unable  to  make  use  of  that  machinery 
to  the  extent  that  your  objective  lack  of  intelligent  faith  dis- 
allowed it. 

To  the  extent  you  have  allowed  this  tuition  to  act  as  a 
Suggestion,  to  the  same  degree  have  you  now  supplied  that 
lack. 

In  many  a  case  there  is  no  option  for  the  subconscious 
but  to  do  the  ignorant  thing,  because  the  accumulation  of  com- 
plexes (adverse  suggestions)  and  ignorance,  outweigh  the  nor- 
mal evolutionary  trends.  With  those  who  have  merely  read 
these  chapters  in  a  spirit  of  deep  consideration  and  fair  play, 
a  new  option  has  been  given  the  subconscious.  But  all  students 
have  done  that  much.  Hence  it  is  up  to  the  enterprise  of  you, 
the  individual  reader  and  student,  to  take  every  advantage  of 
that  option.  And  it  is  fair  to  presume  the  new  option,  at  least 
weighs  as  much  as  any  one  separate  item  in  the  old  (and  to 
some  extent — undesirable)  accumulation.  It  is  up  to  the  stu- 
dent to  make  the  intelligent  view  thus  to  outweigh  the  old  items, 
—separately  at  first.  You  will  soon  enough  see  some  unsatis- 
factory item  that  did  not  suit  your  ideal  at  all,  surely  and 
fundamentally  changing  for  the  better  by  virtue  of  your  appli- 
cation of  psychology — the  new  searchlight.  Several  of  such 
items  might  in  time  so  transform  and  begin  aiding  you  instead 
of  hindering  you — all  thru  the  same  sort  of  application,  modi- 
fied only  by  the  dictates  of  your  own  discrimination  or  com- 
monsense  to  suit  the  specific  problems  that  arise  in  you.  Then 
out  of  it  all,  you  will  yourself  begin  to  arrive  at  the  deepest 
conviction  youVe  ever  had — that  you  can  alter  your  entire  life 
and  destiny  in  this  fashion,  since  you  yourself  have  built  it 
so  far.  Such  deep  convictions  when  arrived  at  thru  individual 


114  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

effort  and  realization,  mold  character.  If  accepted  merely 
because  some  teacher  or  writer  said  so,  such  ''accepted"  realiza- 
tions often  do  more  harm  than  good.  Why?  Because  then 
they  stretch  the  credulity  instead  of  stimulating  initiative  and 
thought.  Nature  is  determined  to  wean  each  human  being, 
not  excluding  you  or  me, — from  the  universal  disinclination  to 
think. 

Character  once  molded  in  line  with  facts  and  laws  of  self- 
knowledge  (which  is  psychology) — then  immediately  the  sub- 
conscious selection  of  ingredients  is  changed  chemically  to  con- 
form to,  and  to  build  out,  to  "ex-press"  the  new  mold  of  char- 
acter, mentally,  psychically,  physically. 

Having  done  this  for  yourself,  your  conviction  in  that 
regard  will  be  an  intelligent  conviction,  because  based  on  a 
demonstrable  fact,  which  you  now  know  you  could  repeat.  An 
intelligent  conviction  of  that  kind  is  a  real  brick  in  the  real 
edifice  of  real  faith.  Any  other  kind  of  faith  is  a  confession 
of  disinclination  to  think  and  eventually  to  know;  any 
other  "belief"  is  a  confession  of  ignorance,  and  moreover,  is 
as  often  a  confession  of  being  content  to  remain  ignorant. 
The  kind  of  faith  that  is  required  is  a  working  faith,  the  kind 
that  -makes  you  conclude  that  if  you  could  do  a  thing  once,— 
then  whenever  necessary  you  can  consciously  undertake  the 
process  again  in  whole  or  in  part,  and  get  equally  good  results. 
That  stage  arrived  at,  there  is  no  harm  in  forming  such  con- 
victions as  prove  by  themselves  that  they  are  supported  by 
deeply  laid  laws  of  the  mind.  At  that  stage  it  is  no  longer 
good  to  be  so  open  minded  that  everything  flies  out.  Con- 
victions actually  based  on  inherent  laws  of  nature  will  act  like 
exhaustless  batteries  for  the  electrical  current  of  an  irresistible 
Faith. 

WHEN?     AND  WHEN  NOT? 

Before  that  phase  is  arrived  at,  it  is  not  advisable  to 
proselyte  and  to  try  to  spread  your  benefits.  Your  benefits  up 
to  that  time  are  likely  to  prove  of  dubious  value  to  others. 
However,  you  will  arrive  at  a  state  of  so-called  advance  some 
day,  where  your  intelligent  appreciation  of  things  as  they  are, 
and  your  faith,  combine.  You  will  then  legitimately  and  in- 
telligently wish,  to  spread  the  benefits  that  you  know  can  be 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  115 

experienced  by   anyone  who  will   apply  and  realize   in  ways 
similar,  tho'  possibly  by  no  means  identical,  to  your  own. 

HEALING 

Now  in  healing  and  dealing  with  others  with  a  view  to 
helping  them  by  what  you  know  of  psychology,  bear  in  mind 
that  magnetism  as  well  as  mind  at  once  come  into  play.  Be 
easy  about  your  arguments;  your  magnetism  will  often  argue 
more  eloquently  than  you  ever  could.  It  is  seen  at  once,  that 
the  way  you  feel  about  it  must,  as  it  were,  be  laid  to  one  side, 
there  to  act  as  a  silent  source  of  power  to  you.  The  person 
you  wish  to  benefit  may  not  be  able  -to  agree  with  your  view- 
point in  the  least.  Probably  the  more  intelligent  your  argument, 
the  more  widely  will  he  disagree.  That  is  but  natural;  he 
has  not  covered  the  same  ground.  Yet  because  you  have 
studied  psychology  and  he  has  not,  he  should  not  be  deprived 
of  what  benefit  you  can  help  bring  about  for  him.  You  see 
the  situation  is  quite  the  other  way  around.  Any  premature 
attempt  to  "convert"  your  beneficiary  to  your  viewpoint  might 
touch  adversely  on  some  well  disguised  "soul-wound"  (trauma 
—as  it  is  called  in  psychoanalysis)  or  some  complex  of  impor- 
tance, sensitiveness,  or  painfulness  to  him.  If  you  descend  to 
argument  with  him,  the  chances  are  that  no  matter  how  rea- 
sonable his  statements,  he  will  "lead  you  on,"  unconsciously, 
and  quite  likely  never  admitting  to  himself  for  a  moment  that 
he  is  doing  so.  The  situation  can  be  likened  to  the  feigned 
leading-on  flight  of  the  thrush  who  wishes  to  lead  you  away 
from  her  nest,  tho'  apparently  trying  to  impress  you  that  she 
is  flying  toward  it. 

ANALYSIS 

Of  course,  if  your  friend  wished  to  subject  himself  to  that 
form  of  mental  surgery  known  as  psychoanalysis,  the  fore- 
going advice  could  be  modified  in  detail,  yet  not  essentially. 
Frankly,  these  pages  have  not  supplied  sufficient  tuition  in  that 
specific  field.  We  shall  try  to  include  a  page  containing  a 
bibliography  of  psychoanalytical  and  other  valuable  literature 
at  the  end  of  this  book.  A  good  psycho-analyst  must  be  a 
rare  combination  of  detective,  psychologist,  surgeon  and  arch- 
angel. Experience  seems  to  show  that  those  persons  who  pre- 
cisely are  not  psychoanalysts,  whatever  else  they  might  be,  most 
often  are  the  ones  who  advertise  and  announce  themselves  as 


116  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  -AND  ESSENTIAL 

psychoanalysts.  A  cure  can  be  more  than  spoiled  by  reading 
or  "imprinting"  one's  own  neuroses  into  the  patient.  There  is 
small  chance  for  the  patient  if  the  analyst  is  not  adept.  And 
self-appointed  "phychoanalysts"  are  not  without  their  own 
neuroses,  complexes  and  even  traumas.  Freud  himself  has 
called  the  procedures  of  such — "Wild  psychoanalysis." 

However,  if  your  friend  unmistakably  shows  that  he  feels 
the  better  for  having  someone  to  listen  to  his  confessions,  let 
him  confess.  Take  advantage  even  of  that.  Keep  alert.  Con- 
siderately and  consistently  you  may  even  probe  then — especially 
if  your  best  surmises  tell  you  that  his  silence  really  is  a  dis- 
guised invitation  to  probe.  Sometimes  a  play  of  hysteria  may 
occur  during  such  a  confession.  Remember  that  the  person  in 
such  trouble  does  not  want  your  expressions  of  sympathy;  he 
wants  you  to  understand.  As  a  psychologist,  remember  also 
that  strong  emotion  equals  a  "camera  moment."  Implant  then 
and  there,  the  rational  psychological  interpretation.  Let  the 
subconscious  mind  of  your  visitor  in  that  manner,  receive  direct 
from  your  lips  the  illuminating  and  intelligent  understanding 
of  the  things  it  has  been  working  out  under  a  misapprehend- 
ing suggestion.  The  intelligent  operator  should  be  able  to 
maintain  all  of  this  procedure  at  a  level  quite  above  the  banal- 
ity of  a  face  to  face  argument.  Whatever  cheapens  the  exter- 
nal procedure,  it  can  be  easily  seen,  also  cheapens  the  sugges- 
tional  value  of  all  the  other  things  said  or  done. 

HEALING — COMMENT  AND  METHOD 

You  know,  or  should  have  realized  by  the  time  you  feel 
able  to  benefit  others  with  applied  psychology,  that  organized 
faith  is  more  powerful  than  were  it  blind  or  unorganized.  You 
have  gone  to  systematic  effort  thus  to  add  strength  to  your 
faith,  and  to  whatever  your  faith  should  prompt  you  to  do. 
A  chronometer  or  a  Swiss  watch  is  worth  dozens  of  clattering 
alarm  clocks.  Either  is  more  systematically  organized,  and 
can  be  used  to  regulate  (to  bring  back  to  normal)  the  con- 
stantly recurring  aberrations  of  the  cheaper  time  machines. 
The  oriental  boy,  hardly  more  than  a  babe,  leads  where  he 
wishes  the  lumbering  elephant — whose  intelligence  tho'  high 
for  an  animal,  is  not  the  synthetic  and  finely  organized  intelli- 
gence of  a  human  child. 

Therefore,  in  the  usual  instance,  where  no  confession  is 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  117 

offered,  do  not  argue.  Say  what  you  are  prompted  to  say. 
But  in  imagination  and  in  the  ''brooding  phase"  by  all  means 
encompass  the  powerful  tools  that  the  subconscious  has  at  its 
command.  You  will  then  know,  that  the  task  of  healing  is  not 
impossible.  It  is  but  child's  play  to  the  miracle  working  giant 
which  it  is  in  your  power  to  arouse. 

Whether  you  are  discussing  current  events  with  the  friend 
you  have  decided  to  help,  the  weather,  or  any  other  inoffen- 
sive topic  does  not  so  much  matter.  Under  all  the  surface 
features  of  the  visit  you  know  he  is  there  to  be  helped  and 
that  you  are  there  to  help  him.  You  are  at  liberty  to  appear 
quite  ordinary,  quite  professional  or  quite  friendly,  as  you 
choose;  yet  in  the  depths  of  your  consciousness  you  can  still 
realize  clearly  that  both  of  you  subconsciously  possess  the  pow- 
ers of  heaven  and  earth  with  which  to  change  the  undesirable 
condition. 

If  the  condition  to  be  relieved  is  physical,  you  know  by 
this  time  that  the  organs,  limbs  and  features  of  your  visitor's 
body  are  but  complicated  worlds  of  intelligent  cells,  living, 
working  and  building  according  to  the  imprints  in  his  subcon- 
scious mind.  You  saw  the  cells  to  be  sensitive  and  sensible,— 
living  their  lives  as  active  artisans;  working,  selecting  their 
nourishment  with  rare  discrimination;  ejecting  effete  matter; 
playing,  reproducing  their  kind,  and  magically  evolving  limbs, 
features  or  faculties  needed  by  unforseen  emergencies.  In 
looking  further,  you  would  find  that  they  are  capable  of  war- 
ring upon,  devouring  or  destroying  and  eliminating  from  the 
physical  system  the  most  deadly  of  invading  bacilli.  And  yet, 
this  cell-universe  is  but  one  of  many  instruments  used  by  the 
subconscious  mind  in  carrying  out  the  fundamental  orders  given 
it  by  your  character,  and  the  detail  directions  given  it  by  your 
objective  thoughts. 

THE  HEALING  PROCEDURE — CONTINUED     / 

Let  us  take  it  for  granted  now  that  thru  experience  and 
conclusions  derived  therefrom  by  meditation,  you  have  realized 
that  illuminating  and  constructive  suggestions  implanted  in  the 
subconscious  mind  will  work  out  in  rebuilt  health  and  strength 
for  your  visitor.  Your  thought,  then,  which  comprehends  all 
this,  is  more  systematized,  and,  therefore,  from  the  subcon- 
scious standpoint,  is  stronger  than  any  loud-mouthed  opinion 


118  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

or  notion  about  such  things  that  the  other  may  have.  A 
thought  based  on  experience  and  conviction  of  law  and  fact, 
is  mesmeric.  We  might  put  it  this  way: — Thought  based 
on  experience  and  conviction  of  fact,  both  possesses  and  like- 
wise engenders  mesmeric  values.  It  has  a  power  in  itself  to 
penetrate  the  critical  and  argumentative  objective  phase,  then 
the  censorship  of  the  subjective,  and  to  reach  the  very  roots  of 
the  mind — namely  the  subconscious. 

To  get  a  still  greater  impingement  of  "power  for  health" 
for  your  thought,  spoken  and  acted  procedure, — imagine, 
design,  and  again  imagine  the  condition  desired.  Imagine  it 
until  its  vividness  outshines  every  other  feature  in  your  "brood- 
ing" or  subjective  phase  of  mind.  It  is  not  necessary  to  say 
much.  What  is  said  must  carry  weight,  of  course.  But  the 
"great  work"  is  always  accomplished  telepathically,  whether 
the  person  to  be  benefited  is  in  your  office  or  a  thousand  miles 
away.  As  you  imagine  definitely  what  is  desired,  you  will  sud- 
denly feel  within  you  a  movement  of  Will.  That  movement 
of  will  acts  as  pressure  or  influence  both  on  your  own  subcon- 
scious and  on  that  of  your  friend.  The  object  of  that  pressure 
and  influence  is  that  the  designed  and  desired  condition,  just 
as  it  is  glowing  in  your  imagination,  be  made  manifest  in  the 
physical  body  of  your  visitor.  It  means  that  the  design  of 
Health  has  overflowed  the  banks  of  your  own  mind,  and  into 
the  subconscious  reservoir  of  the  other.  There  automatically 
it  will  be  absorbed  by  the  intelligent  cells  of  the  other.  It 
will  be  taken  up  by  them  as  a  burning  lamp  would  be  "taken 
up"  if  brought  into  a  darkened  room  containing  a  thousand 
mirrors. 

The  cells  work  broadly  in  line  with  the  picture,  be  it  of 
health  or  of  sickness,  that  is  thus  reflected  by  their  tiny  minds. 
With  this  "movement  of  will"  you  have  done  much,  probably 
all,  that  is  needed  to  change  the  disease  picture  the  cells  of 
your  friend  were  carrying  and  working  out,  to  a  health-picture 
— which  now  they  will  carry,  reflect  and  work  out  with  the 
same  degree  of  skill  and  conscientiousness. 

A  WORD  FOR  MAGNETISM  AND  RAPPORT 

The  vital  energy,  or  magnetism,  formerly  described,  itself 
is  not  devoid  of  a  form  of  intelligence.  It  might  be  called 
semi-intelligent.  Emotions  and  thoughts  are  built  out  of  this 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  119 

semi-intelligent  essence;  imagination  molds  it  as  a  lightning-  . 
rapid  sculptor  would  mold  clay.  It  swarms  and  surges  with 
a  sub-human  yearning  to  be  made  use  of  by  you.  It  is  the 
carrier  of  vital  currents,  finer  but  analogous  to  electricity.  It 
extends  from  a  few  inches  to  several  feet  outside  of  the  body 
which  it  pervades.  One's  own  room  or  office  is  usually  per- 
vaded with  it,  even  long  after  the  departure  of  the  tenant. 
Often  sensitive  people  will  note  strange  thoughts  and  impulses 
assailing  them  immediately  after  moving  into  new  living  quar- 
ters. "Checking  up"  on  the  conditions  of  the  preceding  ten- 
ancy will  usually  solve  the  mystery  regarding  the  origin  of 
such  compulsions. 

Saturating  the  office  of  the  practitioner,  if  healthful  and 
constructive,  this  vital  magnetism  will  of  itself  act  as  'a  helper 
in  any  specific  work  or  object  to  be  accomplished  along  this 
line.  This  makes  it  more  desirable  to  have  those  you  wish 
to  benefit,  call  on  you,  if  possible,  than  for  you  to  call  on 
them.  Use  common  sense  in  making  exceptions,  as  well  as  in 
working  up  psychological  advantages  to  compensate  when  you 
do  make  the  exceptions. 

We  had  it  a  moment  ago  that  the  "aura"  of  psycho- 
physical  force,  "extends  from  a  few  inches  to  several  feet  out- 
side the  body  which  it  pervades."  In  a  state  of  intense  objec- 
tive activity, — running,  wrestling,  etc.,  the  aura  retracts  almost 
entirely  to  the  proportions  of  the  physical  body.  In  deep 
trance  it  extends  outward  many  feet.  In  resting,  as  for  in- 
stance after  pleasant  fatigue,  it  extends  outward  a  number  of 
feet,  passively.  It  is  then  that  it  most  easily  establishes  a 
temporary  blending  with  the  aura  of  any  well  disposed  person 
who  may  be  present.  The  nearer  to  a  state  of  perfect  rest, 
physical  and  mental,  that  you  can  bring  your  friend,  the  greater 
results  and  better  will  he  carry  away  with  him  at  the  end  of 
his  visit. 

In  short,  tactfully  contrive  that  in  some  way  he  fulfills  the 
formula  of: 

1. — Relaxation  (physical). 
2. — Passivity  (mental). 

3. — Fixation  of  Attention  (on  the  subject  of  health 
exclusive  of  his  worries). 


120  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

Be  always  alert;  during  the  entire  procedure  see  to  it  that 
in  a  whole-souled  manner  you  are  always  thinking  and  acting 
in  terms  of  certainty  instead  of  uncertainty.  "For  ye  know 
not  at  what  hour," — nor  for  that  matter  do  you  know  during 
which  particular  moment  of  that  unknown  hour,  your  visitor 
may  be  in  his  most  camera-like  moments  of  fixed  attention. 
His  subconscious  will  then  take  pictures  from  your  mind,  from 
your  magnetism,  your  aura,  and  from  all  that  is  you.  The 
pictures  so  taken  will  probably  be  by  ear,  tho'  not  necessarily ; 
probably  by  his  eyes, — but  not  necessarily, — but  always  by  his 
(already)  clairvoyant  and  clairaudient  subconscious  thru  his 
own  sensitive  aura  of  vital  energy. 

You  may  well  imagine,  as  soon  as  your  visitor  is  at  rest 
mentally  and  physically — if  he  is  no  longer  fidgeting,  nor 
worrying,  nor  arguing, — that  then  his  aura  has  begun  to  con- 
tact "you"  with  a  million  feelers  the  intelligent  sensitiveness  of 
which  could  be  described  by  no  physical  simile.  A  perfect  con- 
dition of  that  kind  is  called  "rapport."  Often  it  is  well  to 
take  such  a  state  of  rapport  for  granted.  There  seem  to 
be  no  certain  physical  indications  for  it.  Sometimes,  but  not 
always,  with  the  establishment  of  the  rapport  there  may  be 
detected  a  deepening  of  the  breathing,  a  sudden  more  complete 
relaxation  of  muscular  and  nervous  tension,  or  an  unusual 
steadiness  of  gaze.  For  the  duration  of  such  rapport  regard 
your  visitor  as  stationed  in  a  "camera  position,"  in  a  "fixation 
of  attention  position."  The  entire  period  of  rapport  is  a  pro- 
longed psychological  moment.  It  means  in  short,  that  then 
the  subconscious  mind  of  the  person  is  taking  a  succession  of 
photographs  exclusively  from  the  person,  object,  or  condition 
with  which  the  rapport  is  established. 

If  the  condition  of  rapport  is  taken  for  granted  as  soon 
as  the  visitor  is  at  rest,  no  advantages  will  be  lost.  Often  a 
psychologist  loses  magnificent  opportunities  by  trying  ineptly 
to  induce  the  condition  when  already  in  that  very  sitting,  it 
has  probably  occurred  a  dozen  times — only  to  be  spoiled  by 
the  psychologist  suggesting  the  induction  of  a  condition  that 
is  already  there. 

However,  again  use  common  sense.  Play  to  the  gallery 
of  the  visitor's  mind  if  necessary.  If  you  are  in  position  to 
know  that  mental  argument,  anxiety,  impatience,  etc.,  flee  him 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  121 

at  the  sight  of  some  book,  sacred  or  profane,  then  read  a  few 
passages  with  emphasis  and  unction  from  such  a  book.  If  the 
lack  of  rapport  is  after  all  only  too  obvious,  have  the  subject 
mentally  count  with  you  the  ticking  of  a  clock  or  metronome. 
Count  with  him.  Do  not  count  audibly.  Once  in  a  while  rap- 
port may  be  hastened, —  (tho'  it  is  always  preferable  not  to 
hasten  it)  by  breathing  at  the  same  rate  of  speed — in  unison — 
with  the  person  whose  subconscious  phase  of  mind  is  to  be 
reached. 

Then,  when  argumentative  resistance  is  no  longer  ex- 
erted nor  contemplated, — visualize  strongly  the  condition  you 
wish  to  bring  about  in  your  caller.  As  before  recommended, — 
encompass  in  your  imagination  the  powerful  and  efficient 
resources  which  in  reality  the  mind  of  each  person  has  to  bring 
this  about.  NOW,  with  all  this  as  your  mental  backing,  Speak 
Slowly  and  Distinctly,  Directly  to  the  ENTIRE  Personality  Be- 
fore You — full  knowing  that  a  radiation,  appropriately  trans- 
formed, is  reaching  his  inmost  self.  Do  this  in  conjunction 
with  the  movement  of  Will  described  above.  All  this  is  reach- 
ing  to  the  roots  of  his  mind  by  a  thousand  different  channels,- — 
thru  the  apparent  and  physical  senses,  as  well  as  thru  invisible 
counterparts  of  them;  thru  the  vital  aura, — thus  exerting  an 
electrical  and  controlling  contact  with  a  veritable  center  of 
omnipotence  within  himself. 

THE  HEALING  PROCEDURE — CONCLUDED 

If  the  subject  is  at  all  responsive,  he  will  experience  a 
great  benefit  then  and  there.  Dismiss  him  without  anxious 
inquiry  as  to  how  the  suggestions  "took."  If  you  inquire,  you 
are  pulling  the  seed  up  to  see  how  it  will  grow.  All  "after- 
visit"  enthusing  is  just  that  and  nothing  more.  Discontinue  it 
if  it  has  been  your  practice,  and  note  the  hastened  good  results. 
Have  a  termination  routine  to  your  procedure  just  as  genial, 
just  as  clean  cut,  just  as  certain  as  your  start-routine.  Then 
those  whom  you  are  helping,  even  while  at  their  usual  activities 
away  from  you,  will  be  able  to  advert  back  to  you  mentally 
with  a  clearer  picture.  Whenever  your  picture,  plus  your  en- 
vironment, plus  your  procedure  occurs  to  them,  the  definite 
picture  aroused  in  their  minds  will  act  as  an  inner  or  silent 
repetition  of  your  Suggestions  for  their  benefit.  "The  devils 
steal  only  from  uncounted  stores,"  say  the  Chinese.  Crispness, 


122  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

Definiteness,  etc.,  are  psychological  "counts," — themselves  are 
healthful  suggestions.  See  if  in  the  spirit  of  this  the  office 
arrangement  itself  is  conducive  to  the  best  psychological  effects. 
Remove  distracting  pictures  or  wall  papers.  Have  your  en- 
vironment suggest  utility,  cleanliness,  efficiency  and  health. 

Do  not  submit  to  be  leaned  upon.  Do  not  bargain  with 
nor  have  anything  to  do  with  those  who  want  "treatments." 
Let  them  seek  their  education  elsewhere  until  they  actually 
expect  to  be  healed.  You  worked  for  the  ability  to  benefit 
others ;  let  them  work  to  deserve  it.  Refuse  the  chronic  shop- 
per among  quacks  and  healers.  It  would  take  a  million  years 
to  teach  one  of  that  feather  what  expectation  is. 

THE  SUB-NORMAL  BACK  TO  NORMAL 

In  academic  presentations  regarding  imbecility,  idiocy, 
insanities,  and  the  like,  there  has  been,  and  still  is,  much  danger 
of  adopting  too  physical  a  view  of  these  forms  of  incompe- 
tence. Only  one  form,  paresis,  would  in  some  measure  seem 
to  justify  that  view.  In  regard  to  it,  the  conclusions  seem  to 
be  along  this  line:  the  ataxias  (difficulties  of  movement,  etc.) 
accompanying,  show  the  degeneration  as  affecting  the  entire 
organism,  not  the  brain  alone,  and  the  disease  is  associated 
with  syphilitic  infection  of  long  standing  often  enough  to  indi- 
cate its  presumable  origin.  In  a  deep  sense,  and  possibly  in  a 
racial  sense,  it  can  be  seen  that  misapplied  psychology  there 
too  is  the  ulterior  source  of  origin.  Where  in  autopsies  degen- 
eration of  the  brain  is  found  occasionally  (it  is  but  seldom 
found),  with  one  or  two  forms  of  the  major  dementias,  there 
is  danger  of  being  blinded  by  the  apparency,  and  of  concluding 
erroneously  that  the  condition  of  the  brain  and  body  induced 
the  condition  of  mind. 

Science  can  tell  us  with  infinite  precision  the  way  that 
physical  things  act,  how  they  appear,  etc.,  under  given  circum- 
stances. It  is  the  systematized  knowledge  of  things  observable 
by  the  senses.  Psychology  tells  us  that  the  senses  themselves 
are  ex-press-ions  of  the  self — the  self  being  the  thing  that  has 
generated  and  knitted  together  thru  anterior  evolution  its  own 
needs  and  their  fulfillments,  in  the  form  of  the  five  senses  as 
we  have  them  today, — and  is  by  no  means  finished  with  the 
process  of  enabling  itself  still  further  in  these  directions. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  123 

Psychology  is  coming  to  the  conclusion  that  no  condition 
of  the  embodiment,  (nor  any  part  of  it,  such  as  the  brain) 
ever  yet  preceded  the  condition  of  the  mind.  It  is  the  other 
way  around.  No  disease  starts  of  itself.  A  deliberate  mis-  ^ 
management  of  the  psychic  self,  indulged  in  at  some  time, 
always  has  been  the  cause  of  psychic  disease,  exactly  in  the 
same  way  that  ignoring  or  deliberate  mis-handling  of  physical 
laws  causes  physical  disease  or  impairment.  It  may  be  difficult 
or  even  impossible  for  the  impaired  one  to  remember  when 
and  how  he  purchased  the  disorder  he  now  has.  But  if  psy- 
chology has  hit  upon  an  axiom  in  declaring  that  all  health  and 
all  disease  are  endogenous  (self-caused)  not  exogenous  (caused 
from  outside  of  self),  then  it  does  not  matter  much  where 
and  how  the  purchase  was  made.  The  problem  is  how  to 
uun-purchase." 

A  STIMULATING  SPECULATION 

Some  of  those  who  are  philosophically  inclined  and  who 
accept  that  axiom  (self  causation  of  all  fortune  and  misfor- 
tune) as  the  only  one  conformable  to  the  dictates  of  justice 
and  reason,  believe  with  Hegel,  Spinoza,  Nietzsche  and  other 
great  philosophers,  that  reincarnation  may  be  a  factor.  We 
are  reaping  to  some  extent,  according  to  that  belief,  right  now, 
the  results  of  thought  and  action  in  previous  lives,  as  well  as 
of  the  present  life.  Of  course  that  would  imply  that  all  we 
have  said  about  suggestion,  in  the  long  run  works  even  more 
effectively  on  the  originator  of  the  thought,  suggestion  or 
action,  when  propelled  against  another,  than  if  merely  applied 
to  one's  self.  It  would  mean  that  everything  we  think  or 
wish  or  perform  for  or  against  others,  then  and  there  uncon- 
sciously we  incorporate  as  health  and  fortune,  or  as  disease 
and  misfortune,  into  our  own  ruling  subconscious  suggestions, 
complexes,  urges,  repressions, — themselves  later  to- work  out 
into  our  life  here  and  now,  or  in  a  future  re-embodiment. 
Adherents  of  that  belief  explain  that  there  is  a  universal  law 
of  moral  justice,  and  that  our  earthly  joys  and  sufferings  are 
but  the  balancing  of  reaction  to  action  in  the  instigator  of  the 
action,  whether  the  action  originally  was  mental  or  physical. 
This  supposed  inherency  in  all  action,  they  call  Karma.  Look 
the  word  up  in  the  largest  and  most  recent  dictionaries  if  it 
interests  you. 


124  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

The  advantage  in  that  belief  is  that  soon  its  votary  sees 
he  lives  in  a  universe  of  law;  that  he  must  learn  to  cope 
with  responsibilities  and  not  evade  them;  that  there  is  no  injus- 
tice. On  the  other  hand,  believers  in  reincarnation  are  often 
at  a  disadvantage  in  trying,  by  a  sort  of  garrulous  prosiness,  to 
make  their  belief  explain  things  too  easily,  and  entirely  too 
much.  A  belief,  or  even  the  knowledge  that  the  world  is 
round,  does  not  enable  us  to  travel  any  faster,  yet  in  the  main 
it  tends  to  make  our  travelling  less  uncertain.  To  travel  faster, 
we  had  to  invent  railways,  steamships  and  airplanes.  As 
beliefs,  reincarnation  and  justice  (Karma)  may  be  stimulating 
to  high  endeavor,  but  do  not  afford  any  technique,  or  any 
method  of  going  about  to  improve  one's  embodiment,  charac- 
ter, success,  etc.,  here  and  now.  Whatever  may  be  the  larger 
metaphysical  movements  outside  the  mentally  observable 
kaleidoscope  of  birth,  life  and  death,  our  surest  and  sanest 
method  of  co-operating  and  achieving  the  best  here  and  now, 
is  in  learning  and  more  ably  using  the  tools  we  have.  That 
again  is  psychology. 

HELPING  THE  SUB-NORMAL — CONTINUED 

Let  us  fancy  that  among  your  circle  of  acquaintances  there 
is  a  case  of  arrested  mental  development.  He  is  a  burden  to 
all  concerned.  He  is,  let  us  say,  hopelessly  backward,  not  only 
in  his  education,  but  even  in  his  power  to  associate  ideas.  He 
does  not  seem  to  reflect  upon  his  observations.  Yet  in  a  sense, 
he  is  precocious — tho'  again  incorrigible  and  selfish.  A  typical 
case.  Somewhere,  other  psychologists  have  called  him  a 
moron.  Your  talk  about  Karma  and  reincarnation,  your  talk 
of  sun-worship,  of  Jesus'  great  love  for  sinners,  of  God-good— 
evil-devil,  error  and  mortal  mind,  is  not  calculated  to  radiate 
anything  that  the  unfortunate  one  himself  can  recognize  as 
illumination.  What,  from  the  standpoint  of  applied  psychol- 
ogy, can  be  done?  Can  he  be  made  to  comply  with  the  for- 
mula? Probably  not,  on  casual  trial.  He  may  be  able  to 
rest  and  relax  bodily.  So  far  so  good.  Have  him  do  that  the 
best  he  can.  Failing  that,  he  may  easily  be  induced  to  give 
up  the  mental  chatter  which  he  is  using  in  place  of  thought. 
You  can  then  and  there  begin  to  rehabilitate  his  badly  dis- 
ordered "brooding  phase"  or  subjective  "cross-road"  of  con- 
sciousness. 


. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  125 

All  the  "mental  backing"  required  by  you  in  such  an 
eiiiort,  is  discussed  in  former  paragraphs.  It  all  applies  here 
as  there.  Develop  a  real  interest  in  your  protege.  Realize 
that  you  yourself  are  not  entirely  rid  of  the  moron  phase. 
No  one  is.  Realize  that  your  comparative  excellence,  as  you 
view  him,  is  a  permanently  assured  thing  conditionally.  It  is 
not  an  absolute  certainty.  Were  you  to  misapply  yourself,  in 
ways  that  now  seem  foreign  to  your  nature,  you  would  be  as 
much  of  an  outcast  child  pf  evolution  as  he  seems  to  be.-  By 
such  understanding  you  are  developing  intelligent  interest  in 
him.  Pick  out  his  outstanding  quality;  cogitate  over,  and  cul- 
tivate your  grasp  of  that  quality.  It  is  worth  its  weight  in 
diamonds  to  you,  because  shortly  you  are  to  transform  that 
salient  into  your  entrance  wedge  to  the  nascent  roots  of  his 
real  character.  Often,  the  strongest  quality  in  the  sub-normal 
is  his  selfishness.  He  is  self  centered;  his  only  consecutive 
interest  is  his  self  interest. 

There  may  be  an  infinity  of  reasons  why  all  his  other  men- 
tal mechanisms  save  that  one,  have  ceased  to  grow.  If  the 
sub-normal  himself  demonstrates  a  conscious  insight  into  his 
own  condition  (colloquially — if  he  knows  he  is  "off"),  it  may 
not  be  beside  the  point  to  probe  and  rationalize  any  phantasies 
which  may  by  the  process  of  probing  be  externalized.  If  that 
process  be  used,  then  this  also  may  be  borne  in  mind:  there  is 
a  thinly  veiled  lunacy  indulged  by  many  well-meaning  people, 
which  right  down  at  bottom  would  classify  everything  in  life 
as  wicked  and  unworthy.  The  subconscious  in  such  cases,  of 
course,  is  crammed  with  idiotic  complexes  based  on  such  notions 
as:  that  it  is  wicked  to  breathe  or  drink  with  enjoyment;  eat- 
ing is  wickedness;  the  sexual  act  or  thought  regarding  it  is 
wickedness;  ministering  to  the  body  is  degrading;  to  enjoy  life 
in  any  form  is  sin,  etc.  If  this  foul  condition  is  transferred 
unconsciously  to  a  susceptible  child,  subconsciously  the  logical 
conclusion  is  likely  to  be  a  decision  to  remain  a  moron.  If 
that  subconscious  decision  could  be  articulated,  it  would  prob- 
ably amount  to  this:  "Since  I  cannot  get  back  to  where  I 
started;  and  since  the  land  I  was  supposed  to  travel  bristles 
with  prohibitions  against  life,  love  and  activity,  it  is  better 
for  me  to  abide  at  this  way-station;  thus  far  and  no  further." 
This  "abiding  at  a  way-station"  may  be  a  mild  form  of  demen- 


126  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

tia  precox,  of  paranoia,  depressive  or  hysteriform  incapacity, 
moronism, — in  degrees  all  spelling  "failure"  from  the  social 
and  ethical  standpoint. 

Your  business  is  so  to  contrive,  that  he  will  of  himself 
once  more  wish  to  jump  on  the  train,  leave  the  little  way- 
station,  and  go  on  into  useful  and  efficient  life.  If  his  self- 
interest  is  the  only  angle  that  juts  out  from  the  futile  circle  of 
introversion,  then  use  that  angle.  Excite  his  sense  of  posses- 
sion. Let  him  feel  that  to  own  and  to  possess  is  good.  Let 
him  see  that  exertion  and  effort  will  increase  his  capacity  for 
ownership.  Do  not  let  him  have  things  because  he  asks  for 
them  or  cries  for  them.  That  is  not  enough.  That  would  be 
too  strong  a  suggestion  that  he  remain  an  infant.  Do  not 
point  to  the  self-satisfied  plutocrat  or  the  absolute  monarch 
as  examples  of  anything  worth  emulating.  In  another  octave 
they  are  babes,  getting  things  because  they  ask  for  them.  As 
a  race  we've  held  the  ill-mannered  baby-brat  ideal  too  seriously 
and  too  long.  It  enters  as  an  ingredient  into  all  our  success 
manias.  Lie,  if  necessary,  that  all  possession  is  the  result  of 
endeavor.  Paint  life  in  colors  that  are  attractive  to  him,  not 
to  you, — so  he  will  urge  himself  to  make  the  necessary  endea- 
vors to  own  and  enjoy  more  of  it.  Convince  him  that  he  has 
but  misplaced  possessions  already  his — possessions  of  untold 
value.  And  that  is  the  truth.  If  you  must  do  this  in  ever 
so  childish  a  way,  do  it, — it  is  just  as  well.  Stoop  to  conquer. 
The  more  readily,  then,  will  he  see  it  is  necessary  for  himself 
to  seek,  hunt  and  dig.  He  is  to  learn  that  selfishness  itself  is 
better  served  if  he  develops  several  intelligent  interests  out- 
side himself. 

HELPING  THE  SUB-NORMAL — CONCLUDED 

Melancholia,  the  various  depressed  attitudes  toward  life, 
and  numerous  other  entrenchments  of  failure,  can  be  made  to 
improve  if  environed  by  persons  constantly  thinking  and  acting 
in  ways  here  described.  Often  there  is  no  physical  impairment 
as  yet  to  retrieve.  It  is  misharnessed  and  misguided  energy, 
physical,  psychic  and  mental,  jostling  the  dazed  rider  and  im- 
perilling bystanders.  It  is  ignorantly  misapplied  psychology; 
often  nothing  but  that.  Its  corrective  is  wisely  applied  psy- 
chology. That  wise  application  must  be  conducted  by  sur- 
rounding people  to  so  fine  and  so  comprehending  an  extent 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  127 

that  the  central  person  in   question  himself   and  of  himself, 
finds  and  continues  in  the  reconstructive  application. 

Complicated  cases  should  of  course  receive  institutional 
care.  They  should  not  be  tampered  with;  never  should  they 
be  regarded  as  chances  for  the  beginner  to  utry  my  luck." 
Charlatans  in  this  field  should  be  coldly  and  completely  boy- 
cotted, because  penalization  by  such  is  often  turned  into  self- 
advertisement. 

GENERALIZATION 

No  person  exists  but  responds  to  human  encouragement. 
Correct  psychology  can  make  of  encouragement  a  fine  science. 
Its  purpose  always  should  be  that  the  temporarily  discouraged 
one  seek  and  find  in  himself  the  source  of  his  own  encourage- 
ment. We  all  have  the  phobias  and  neuroses  in  various  de- 
grees of  attenuation, — which  in  the  institutions  we  may  see 
precipitated  and  then  inflated  into  obsessional  values.  Hence 
the  pharisaical  attitude  is  the  least  calculated  to  benefit  those 
who  merit  benefit  from  you,  and  in  the  long  run  that  attitude 
is  the  most  damaging  to  yourself. 

Methods  of  aid  by  applied  psychology  can  be  inferred 
to  any  degree  of  practical  value,  limited  only  by  the  capability 
and  initiative  of  the  student.  Originality  is  a  big  factor.  The 
formulas  can  be  effectualized  in  innumerable  ways  by  those 
who  have  learned  to  put  two  and  two  together. 
CONCLUSION 

In  the  hands  of  those  who  cannot  analyze  nor  synthesize 
nor  draw  sane  conclusions,  all  the  formulas  and  citations  in 
the  world  would  be  but  futile  instruments.  To  such  it  can 
only  be  said,  "you'll  never  get  the  'blessed  truths'  which  you're 
waiting  open-mouthed  to  receive  and  believe.  You'll  never 
evade  the  necessity  and  responsibility  of  learning  to  think  by 
any  such  infantile  ruse  as  that.  To  those  who  are  for  the 
moment  infinitely  more  abject  failures  than  yourself, — the 
advice  was,  seek,  dig,  apply  yourself.  It  is  the  same  to  you. 
If  you  knew  from  the  reports  of  honest  neighbors,  that  during 
a  fit  of  amnesia  or  loss  of  memory,  you  had  buried  a  basket 
of  your  own  diamonds  somewhere  in  your  own  back  yard;  if 
you  knew  that  your  present  impoverished  condition,  in  all 
phases  of  life — friendship,  success,  happiness,  purpose,  health, 
—would  be  yours  only  upon  their  recovery, — who  and  what 


128  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

could  then  dissuade  you  from  digging,  until  you  had  every 
square  inch  of  that  back  yard  spaded  up  and  spaded  up  deep? 
Learning  to  think  is  just  that.  Psychology  or  self-knowledge 
is  one  of  the  jewels  contained  in  that  neglected  basket,  of 
greater  value  than  all  the  diamonds  yet  dug.  Do  not  flatter 
yourself  that  you  already  know  how  to  think.  There  are  still 
possibilities  in  that  direction.  No  great  thinker  has  ever  yet 
so  flattered  himself.  The  savage  seated  in  his  hollow  log, 
paddle  in  hand,  might  well  have  nodded  his  head  sagely,  say- 
ing: 'I  already  know  all  about  navigation,  for  I  convey  myself 
over  the  water.'  Lucky  then  we  poor  benighted  agnostics  who 
have  gone  right  ahead  and  invented  the  steamship  anyway." 


The  reader  has  covered  a  range,  which  so  far  as  tuition 
by  printed  word  can  go,  may  be  regarded  as  complete.  At 
any  rate  it  is  complete  in  one  direction.  There  are  many 
directions,  some  just  as  valuable  as  the  one  now  traversed. 

We  have  attempted  to  show  a  phase  of  universal  law 
which  most  intimately  touches  ourselves.  That  law  cannot  be 
seen,  touched,  nor  heard.  Yet  the  degree  to  which  it  is  com- 
prehended, adds  value  to  seeing,  touching  and  hearing;  makes 
of  existence — Life;  makes  of  life — Realization  of  the  Ideal. 

The  next  chapter,  which  concludes  the  present  manuscript, 
is  not  intended  for  a  lesson.  It  is  merely  preferred  as  a  sharing 
of  experience  with  fellow  students.  Before  indulging  in  its 
rather  too  metaphysical  ramblings,  a  little  fable  occurs  to  us, 
which  might  be  entitled : 


LAW 

A  MAN  of  common  sense  heard  among  sea-faring  men  that 
Longitudes,  Latitudes  and  especially  the  Equator  were 
in  fabulous  repute.  He  chartered  a  yacht  and  braved  ocean 
storms  that  he  might  see  the  Equator.  He  never  saw  it.  He 
returned  safely,  but  he  had  suffered  mal  de  mer  and  was  much 
disappointed  for  having  believed  the  wild  tales  of  mariners. 

Again  from  astronomers  and  philosophers  the  man  of 
common  sense  heard  about  the  incredible  value  of  the  Earth's 
Axis.  He  extorted  the  wealth  of  Croesus  and  of  Rockefeller, 
he  exhausted  the  genius  of  Archimedes  and  of  Edison  to  con- 
trive apparatus;  he  enslaved  the  labor  of  a  million  men,  who 
dug  four  thousand,  and  then  eight  thousand  miles  straight 
down  and  thru  the  globe, — all  that  he  might  see  the  Axis 
around  which  the  world  revolves.  And  he  did  not  see  it. 
Neither  did  he  prove  his  own  foolishness.  He  wrote  books, 
and  convinced  thousands  of  gushing  truth  seekers  that  no  axis 
exists. 

Yet  navigation  continued;  commerce  went  on  unperturbed 
as  tho'  this  man  of  common  sense  had  never  lived.  More- 
over, the  morning  after  the  publication  of  the  books,  the  four 
cardinal  directions  were  not  in  the  least  disturbed,  nor  the 
measurements  of  Time. 

And  to  add  insult  to  injury,  the  world  continued  to  re- 
volve on  its  axis. 


Moral: — IT  is  A  VICE  OF  MATERIALISM  TO 

DENY  THOSE  REALITIES  WHICH  WILL  NOT 
BECOME   UNREAL  ENOUGH  TO  OBJECTIFY. 


129 


VIII 

A  DAY  DREAM 

I  WAS  wandering  thru  the  park  of  a  great  city.    In  the  morn- 
ing's preparations  for  my  walk,  I  had  spontaneously  im- 
planted in  my  mind  a  suggestion  for  the  main  thoughts  of 
the  day.    We-  all  do  this  whether  or  not  we  know  it.     I  wanted 
some  clear  and  valuable  conception  which  I  could  transfer  to 
fellow  students.     I  was  seeking  a  clearer  view,  a  more  com- 
prehensive revelation  of  the   causes  underlying  success — the 
ability  to  live  more  and  to  grow  more.     I  did  not  mind  if  my 
fancies  proved  airy,  so  long  as  they  were  in  that  direction.     I 
felt  more  metaphysical  than  analytical.     Whenever  we  make 
mind  or  thought  itself  the  subject  of  our  thinking,  we  are 
headed  toward  the  subconscious  in  the  most  intelligent  way. 

Occasionally  I  regarded  the  trees  and  flowers.  Once  I 
noticed  also  that  a  squirrel  came  near  me.  Then  chattering 
at  my  lack  of  foresight  that  I  had  brought  him  no  nuts,  he  dis- 
appeared in  the  foliage  of  a  great  tree. 

I  came  presently  to  an  obscure  little  bypath.  It  led  me  to 
an  artificial  lake,  at  the  edge  of  which,  seeing  an  inviting  shrub- 
encumbered  bench,  I  obeyed  what  seemed  to  be  a  subconscious 
summons  to  sit  and  rest. 

It  may  be  that  I  went  to  sleep.  I  do  not  know.  Through- 
out the  incidents  of  the  following  vision  drama,  I  recall  often 
seeing  the  sparkle  of  the  lake. 

I  had  no  sooner  sat  down  than  it  was  quite  clear  to  me 
that  I  was  just  now  departing  from  a  certain  location  outside 
our  solar  system.  I  had  resided  there  for  uncounted  aeons. 
While  there,  I  had  not  been  learning  to  live, — as  the  inhabit- 
ants of  this  planet  without  exception  are  doing, — but  had  al- 
ready been  living, — physically  immortal,  if  I  chose  to  be,  or 
changing  embodiment  consciously,  if  I  cared  for  a  new  or  dif- 
ferent sort  of  body.  In  that  place  the  effects  of  no  elemental 
buffeting  of  storms,  either  of  wind  cyclones,  nor  the  internal 
gales  of  pride,  vanity,  or  avarice,  could  touch  me.  Such  gales 
and  cataclysms  did  ride  and  blow  there  as  thruout  the  universe. 

131 


132  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

But  in  that  old,  mellow,  perfected  planet  I  had  a  well  trained 
host  of  magic  servants,  who  counteracted  inadvertencies  and 
accidents  with  ease  at  a  mere  nod  from  rne.  On  this  morning 
of  my  departure  the  great  sun  presiding  in  that  remote  do- 
minion of  space,  rose  in  wondrous  magnitude;  the  air  itself 
shimmered  with  the  colors  of  rose  and  gold.  I  set  out,  riding 
the  air  in  a  chariot-like  vehicle,  drawn  with  whirlwind  force  by 
a  harnessed  legion  of  brilliant  beings  who  seemed  to  be  each  a 
composite  of  a  god  and  an  animal. 

Something  said  to  me:  "You  are  viewing  His  descent 
and  yours;  an  old  eternity  is  left  and  a  new  one  is  entered." 
I  could  not  understand  this ;  I  forgot  to  ask  an  explanation ;  1 
was  too  much  absorbed  in  beholding  the  glorious  spectacle — 
for  I  was  both  rider  and  beholder.  In  the  etherially  golden 
harness,  I  noted  again  with  a  great  throb  those  fabulously  per- 
fect embodiments  of  energy;  they  were  like  lithe,  tawny  ani- 
mals; yet  they  were  not  unlike  active  young  gods.  I  marveled 
again  at  the  incredible  ease  writh  which  they  conveyed  the 
equipage  in  the  direction  the  rider  wished  to  go. 

That  they  should  ever  become  disorganized!  That  they 
should  become  things  of  cunning  and  selfishness — which  now  I 
felt  by  prescience  they  might  become  ! 

I  alighted  blithesomely,  a  strange  visitor  on  a  strange 
little  planet  called  Earth.  The  wild  life  scampered  to  cover, 
torn  between  terror  and  innate  curiosity.  The  hills  quaked 
slightly.  I  had  landed  on  a  great  sunlit  plateau.  "This  truly 
is  the  roof  of  this  little  world,"  was  my  first  thought.  I  felt 
like  some  great  Nature  Spirit,  delegated  to  brood  over  this 
spring-decked  and  breeze-blown  land.  I  seemed  immeasur- 
ably huge,  cosmic,  universal.  If  I  had  seen  humans  at  the 
time,  I  might  have  been  interested  in  them  as  in  some  race  of 
rather  active  insects.  My  senses  of  sight  and  hearing  were 
intelligent;  with  humans  this  is  not  so.  For  instance,  I  needed 
to  strain  but  little,  and  the  wind  rustling  in  the  grass  with 
something  in  it  of  legend  and  tradition,  would  tell  me  the 
secret  history  of  galaxies  and  other  things  immeasurable  to 
the  human  mind. 

For  the  first  time  I  gave  way  to  two  great  emotions,  based 
on  some  false  conviction  of  superiority. 

, — I  allowed  myself  to  luxuriate  in  unbounded  con- 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  133 

tempt  for  those  who  must  involuntarily  inhabit  this  puny 
sphere.  /  would  sojourn  here  a  while  because  I  willed  it. 

Second, — I  gave  way  to  the  unbounded  elation  of  a 
Nirvanee, — of  a  DeQuincy  under  an  overdose  of  opium — in 
thinking  that  this  new  little  place  could  throw  no  difficulty  upon 
me  that  I  could  not  manipulate  as  a  pellet  of  putty  in  my  hand. 

Emotions  produce  reactions.  I  was  not  prepared.  It 
came  slyly — in  what  apparently  was  an  honest  form  of  fatigue 
following  a  long  journey.  My  lithe,  magical  servants  whis- 
pered languorous  insinuations.  They  lied — the  most  refresh- 
ing rest  would  be  abrogation  of  authority  and  responsibility. 
I  forgot  this  would  mean  abrogation  of  the  same  amount  of 
liberty,  and  believed  them.  The  drowsy,  tangled  dream  into 
which  I  was  already  sinking  was  filled  with  subdued  chatter  of 
the  treasons  they  were  then  enacting.  It  sounded  melodiously 
in  my  ears.  I  was  already  in  the  anteroom  of  the  palace  of 
slumber.  I  allowed  the  new  environment  to  gain  ascendancy 
over  myself.  I  could  feel  it,  as  I  lay  pillowed  in  the  mosses 
and  grass.  It  seemed  a  mountain  had  begun  to  accumulate 
over  me.  I  did  not  know  what  I  was  to  experience  in  conse- 
quence of  allowing  a  surface  ripple  thus  to  outweigh  a  long 
established  tidal  sweep  toward  an  ideal.  The  symbol  of  that 
unified  purpose,  the  etherially  light  harness  or  chain  of  gold 
which  my  magical  subordinates  had  worn  with  honor,  I  saw 
was  suddenly  broken  into  bits.  I  did  not  care  then.  I  fell 
asleep. 

I  awoke — it  seemed  in  a  few  moments — it  seemed  from 
death.  I  was  feverish  and  delirious.  I  wanted  to  know  how 
long  I  had  slept.  A  voice  in  the  delirium  replied,  "Three  hun- 
dred thousand  and  forty  years  of  the  earth."  I  was  now  a 
giant  both  in  body  and  soul.  I  was  not  sure  of  this,  but  that 
also  in  a  mysterious  way,  I  had  been  told.  I  believed  it  be- 
cause of  my  vast  suffering.  None  but  a  giant  could  suffer  so 
much.  The  former  and  more  happy  impressions  seemed  now 
withdrawn  to  some  remotely  past  eternity.  I  wanted  so  much 
to  be  sure  I  was  a  giant.  That  would  lend  me  self-confidence. 
But  infallible  assurance  seemed  out  of  my  reach,  for  tho'  I 
could  look  around  and  outward,  I  could  not  look  inward  nor 
in  anywise  make  known  to  myself  my  own  proportions.  Up 
to  my  head  I  was  buried  under  a  veritable  mountain,  so  that 


134  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

my  limbs  were  not  free.  Any  attempt  to  move  my  concealed 
self  resulted  in  friction  and  great  pain.  Out  of  shere  anguish 
at  having  to  be  so  stagnant,  occasionally  I  would  shrug  a»n 
arm,  move  a  foot,  or  try  to  bend  an  elbow.  And  I  noted  then, 
that  great  boulders  often  would  be  dislodged  from  the  moun- 
tain side,  and  roll  into  the  adjoining  abysses  with  a  loud  crash. 

I  wondered  if  I  should  have  to  remove  the  entire  moun- 
tain by  such  meager  and  spasmodic  efforts.  I  speculated 
drearily  how  long  that  would  take.  For  huge  as  I  suspected 
myself  to  be,  the  mountain  which  so  imprisoned  me,  was  vast. 
When  I  grieved,  it  seemed  the  tears  themselves  made  the  moun- 
tain more  concrete,  and  that  around  my  head — a  most  awkward 
place.  Once,  insanely  impatient,  I  shook  at  the  impediments 
to  my  liberty  with  the  energy  of  a  cyclonic  demon.  But  after 
a  brief  numbness  the  pain  was  worse,  and  the  resulting  per- 
spiration only  solidified  the  cement  bearing  rocks  about  my 
body  the  tighter.  I  was  again  outwitted.  I  dared  not  give 
way  to  any  form  of  excess.  I  had  the  Will  to  do,  but  did  not 
know  how. 

Daily  I  had  observed  separate  hordes  of  little  sprites 
gamboling  about  the  rocks  and  furrows  of  this  mountain,  which 
seemed  to  be  their  natural  habitation.  There  were  several 
distinct  tribes;  there  were  striking  characteristics  to  distinguish 
one  clan  from  another,  among  which  always  appeared  the 
same  figure  woven  in  the  clothes  worn  by  members  of  the 
same  tribe.  For  instance,  there  was  one  tribe  which  appeared 
absurdly  pious,  and  in  their  clothes  always  appeared  the 
numeral  6.  Another  clan  impressed  me  as  being  specialists  in 
some  kind  of  training;  if  they  had  been  human,  they 
would  have  been  designated  as  the-  "mental  type;"  their 
numeral  was  5.  Another  legion  looked  ridiculously  senti- 
mental— unadulterated  embodied  emotions ;  these  wore  the 
number  4.  Most  of  them  were  active.  Some  seemed  weirdly 
intelligent.  Some  again  showed  no  more  intelligence  than  a 
vegetable  or  a  lump  of  lead,  living  quite  passively  in  the  rocks 
and  shrubs.  The  shrub  dwellers  displayed  the  number  2,  and 
the  rock  dwellers  the  number  1. 

I  began  to  wonder  if  any  of  these  could  give  me  a  help- 
ful hint  about  self-liberation.  One  of  the  pious  sprites  hap- 
pened to  be  nearby.  I  hailed  him.  Twirling  his  thumbs  in 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  135 

a  most  quaker-like  fashion,  he  approached  me  sedately.  I  had 
wanted  to  explain  my  condition  to  him — but  he  did  the  explain- 
ing. Of  course  he  had  everything  wrong.  But  he  said  it  all 
with  a  great  air  of  unctuous  omniscience.  He  told  me  I  should 
be  more  trusting,  but  he  said  it  in  such  a  udon't-ask-me-what-I- 
mean-by-that"  manner,  with  such  sanctimonious  posing,  that  I 
was  non-plussed.  If  we  say  we  trust,  and  then  do  not  act,  we 
are  lying.  Only  mistrust  enforces  idleness  and  confinement. 
But  I  did  not  dare  to  say  this  to  him.  He  must  have  been 
nervous,  for  he  was  careful  to  tell  me  that  if  I  did  not  believe 
him  I  would  go  to  hell.  Evidently  he  had  forgotten  how  hard 
it  is  to  scare  any  person  who  is  already  in  the  place  that  suits 
him  least.  He  had  admonished  me  to  do  as  he  said,  yet  he  had 
said  nothing  that  I  could  do.  The  means  of  doing  anything 
were  not  in  my  possession  so  long  as  I  lay  buried. 

When  he  left,  I  found  a  small  ivory  casket  which  he  had 
dropped  while  speaking  to  me.  I  would  have  called  to  him, 
but  he  was  already  on  the  other  side  of  the  mountain.  On 
second  thought,  I  covered  the  little  box  with  my  hair,  where  it 
would  be  invisible  should  he  return. 

Next  I  hailed  a  "5."  I  expected  much  from  him.  He 
seemed  an  able  fellow.  I  fancied  his  tribe  most  resembled 
myself.  He,  just  like  the  "6"  had  done,  enlarged  miraculously 
as  I  thought  these  things  of  him.  After  the  salutation,  he 
arranged  a  chart,  illustrating  my  difficulty  to  me.  This  he  did 
skillfully,  yet  I  could  feel  he  had  some  trace  of  ulterior  pur- 
pose of  which  I  knew  nothing,  and  suddenly  cared  even  less. 
I  knew,  what  he  comprehended  only  in  ingenious  but  erroneous 
theory.  I  felt  sure  that  in  some  subtle  way  he  was  conniving 
with  my  pious  friend  of  the  previous  day  to  keep  me  in  bond- 
age. I  dismissed  him  in  a  huff.  His  departure  was  so  hasty 
that  he  left  a  tiny  clasped  scroll,  which  at  no  time  during  the 
visit  had  he  unrolled.  I  could  not  unclasp  it,  of  course,  with 
my  hands  still  buried.  So  I  treated  it  as  I  had  treated  the  ivory 
casket  of  the  pious  sprite,  and  concealed  it  under  my  hair.  I 
now  began  to  doubt  seriously  whether  any  help  at  all  could  be 
expected  of  these  curious  gentry. 

Yet  I  called  in  the  tribe  of  the  emotional  dancing  folks, 
their  pink  and  green  drapes  showing  the  figure  4.  Among 
them  there  was  much  sentiment,  much  infatuation  one  for  the 


136  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

other,  with  incontinent  flurries  of  dislike.  Their  chatter  was 
sweet  and  melodious.  Despite  their  voluble  professions  of 
sympathy,  they  did  not  know  how  to  give  sane  advice.  Most 
of  them  said  that  I  should  find  a  great  deal  of  pleasure  if  I 
decided  only  to  enjoy  my  confinement,  instead  of  straining 
always  to  be  free.  Gloat  over  my  own  confinement  indeed! 
I  was  glad  when  they  wearied  of  me  and  left,  bent  on  their 
own  airy  gambols. 

Two  or  three  times  I  hailed  other  legions.  I  remembered 
one  disorderly  tribe,  with  bodies  of  animal  strength — the  hides 
they  wore  for  clothes  stamped  with  the  number  3.  They 
showed  their  teeth,  sneering  at  me  as  much  as  to  say,  "Why 
do  you  not  use  brute  strength?"  but  remained  impervious  to 
my  explanation  that  I  had  tried  that  method  and  failed.  Yet 
thereafter,  it  was  these  brutes  who  brought  me  food,  often 
snarling  the  while.  The  shrub  dwellers,  showing  the  number  2, 
once  proposed  to  make  my  mountain  more  beautiful  with  flow- 
ers, if  I  would  but  promise  not  to  try  to  get  away  from  it; 
and  the  still  more  inert  rock  dwellers  consented  (as  tho'  I  had 
ever  asked  them  any  such  thing!)  to  weight  the  entire  moun- 
tain with  gold  and  precious  stones  on  the  same  condition. 

I  was  more  weary  than  ever  of  all  this  business  of  talking 
in  a  circle.  Everything  had  been  cheaply  and  copiously  dis- 
cussed but  liberty.  And  after  all,  everything  but  liberty  and 
power  to  do  things  for  myself,  was  so  utterly  beside  the  point. 
Was  all  my  search  vain? 

At  this  moment  a  startling  thing  happened.  It  unnerved 
me  for  a  moment.  Out  of  the  mountain, — or  it  might  have 
been  from  its  summit, — a  voice  spoke:  "You  have  taken  their 
message  despite  their  words."  The  shock — combined  with  a 
feeling  that  the  possessor  of  that  voice  intended  for  me  a  great 
good,  struck  me  as  a  double  shaft  of  lightning  might  strike. 
It  was  not  at  all  like  the  voice  I  had  heard  in  delirium.  I  felt 
privileged  to  relax  for  a  moment,  and  moved  my  hand  to 
release  it  from  strain.  In  doing  so,  accidentally  the  scroll 
became  uncoiled  with  a  snap.  It  had  been  wound  with  a  strong 
outward-bearing  spring.  I  read  its  contents.  It  seemed  to  be 
in  two  divisions.  The  first  I  could  decipher.  I  was  not  im- 
patient about  the  rest,  feeling  that  in  time  I  would  ascertain 
the  entire  meaning.  The  readable  part  was  a  strange  thing. 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  137 

It  seemed  to  be  a  sort  of  secret  prayer  or  incantation.  Likely 
this  "5th  triber"  had  never  dared  to  breathe  it  audibly.  Per- 
haps, way  down,  he  had  even  dreaded  that  the  wishes  therein 
contained  might  be  carried  out.  Yet  there  it  was:  "I  hate 
the  stone-sitters  and  these  shrub-sitters  fervently!  They  are 
inert!  By  their  stupidity  they  impede  my  researches  whereby 
I  might  gain  more  power  over  the  sleeping  giant.  I  curse  the 
brutish  third  tribe;  may  they  sicken!  Their  insolence  stands 
between  me  and  entire  subjugation  of  the  giant!  Maledic- 
tions upon  the  pink  and  green  clan — intent  upon  each  other's 
worthless  selves  by  way  of  love,  hate,  and  all  that  follows ! 
Not  one  in  a  hundred  of  my  traps  for  the  sleeper  remains 
unbroken,  by  their  carelessness,  long  enough  to  show  its  worth ! 
And  O  that  collective  horror  of  hypocrisy,  the  tribe  of  the 
pious  ones!  May  a  venomous  plague  exterminate  them  during 
the  dark  of  the  moon  and  in  one  fatal  night!  If  only  'He' 
knew  how  important  in  keeping  him  pinioned,  and  yet  how 
easily  dislodged  is  the  very  rock  on  which  he  rests  his  head! 
Woe  is  me  if  he  discovers!"-— here  the  readable  part  of  this 
curious  tirade  ended,  and  the  undecipherable  characters  com- 
menced. 

Of  course  I  directed  what  force  I  was  free  to  use  upon 
the  rock  I  had  used  for  a  pillow.  And  sure  enough,  this  great 
stone,  worn  smooth  by  my  own  head,  was  quickly  wrenched 
from  its  position,  and  I  heard  it  crash  on  some  ledge  far  below. 
I  had  always  refrained  from  trying  any  movement  whatever 
with  that  particular  rock.  Like  a  mental  habit, — like  a  famil- 
iar attitude,  it  always  had  seemed  gratefully  comfortable. 
Now  that  I  had  dislodged  it  in  the  face  of  discomfort,  I  noted 
with  joy  I  had  one  arm  free  already,  and  there  were  clefts 
visible  in  many  of  the  boulders,  which  before  had  been  solid. 
I  set  to  work  with  my  free  arm.  Alas !  I  could  not  in  any- 
wise find  leverage  enough  to  move  even  the  smallest  of  the 
remaining  huge  rocks,  which  still  weighed  down  the  rest  of 
my  body. 

Just  then  a  little  cynical  imp  appeared.  I  forget  which 
tribe  he  belonged  to.  He  pretended  not  to  notice  my  predica- 
ment. I  asked  him,  exasperated,  if  his  grin  was  the  only  aid 
he  could  lend  me  in  my  effort.  That  banished  his  taciturnity. 
He  replied  that  the  only  liberty  I  would  ever  achieve  would  be 
in  the  anticipations  and  expectations  of  it;  that  I  was  fruit- 


138  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

lessly  exerting  myself.  He  said  if  I  gained  freedom,  I  would 
be  more  than  ever  dissatisfied;  that  I  would  pine  not  only  for 
the  reclining  pose,  but  actually  for  the  involuntary  imprison- 
ment, which,  of  course,  once  broken,  I  should  never  be  able  to 
regain  in  full  measure.  Even  if  I  should  imprison  myself 
thereafter,  he  assured  me,  it  would  be  a  counterfeit  imprison- 
ment, because  voluntary.  He  declared  he  knew  many  who 
were  free,  and  the  possession  of  their  full  powers  was  too 
much  and  too  irksome.  They  spent  their  after  days  in  keen 
regrets  for  the  happiness  lost  forever  when  freed  from  their 
stony  prisons.  He  left  then,  burning  a  weedy  cigarette,  from 
which  live  sparks  fell  and  scorched  my  free  hand. 

I  believed  nothing  he  said.  Yet  it  weighed  in  upon  me 
as  to  the  probable  uselessness  of  further  effort.  I  recalled 
the  ivory  casket  now,  and  opened  it.  It  was  significantly  made 
in  the  form  of  a  prayer  book.  The  pious  "6th  tribers"  evi- 
dently were  nursing  wishes  just  as  virulent  as  those  of  the 
"5th."  The  readable  paragraph  closed  with  these  words :  "O 
that  the  imprisoned  one  were  to  forget  his  effort  but  for  a 
day;  for  his  habitual  distraction  alone  keeps  him  inflamed  and 
swollen,  and  without  that  the  cave  could  not  hold  him.  I 
would  incite  him  to  slay  all  the  tribes  but  mine.  I  would  then 
fill  him  with  remorse,  for  I  know  his  weakness.  He  would 
then  crawl  back  into  his  prison — and  his  subjugation  to  me 
alone  would  be  permanent." 

Thought  I  to  myself,  "Why  this  amazing  enmity  between 
these  different  tribes,  and  what  is  the  mysterious  connection 
their  own  welfare  seems  to  have  with  me?"  I  wondered  if 
I  could  not  carry  out  the  bloody  things  hinted  in  this  last 
parchment,  and  escape  the  remorse  and  self-reimprisonment. 
The  same  clear  voice,  as  from  off  the  mountain  top,  inter- 
rupted, bidding  me  to  recognize,  if  I  could,  in  the  dubious  and 
devious  little  folks,  who  furtively  tried  to  misinform  me  now, 
during  lapses  in  their  own  activities  on  the  mountain,  the  dere- 
licts of  that  former  wonderful  organization  with  which  I  had 
"landed,"  an  eternity  ago. 

"No  living  thing  has  yet  been  killed  since  the  dawn  of 
time.  To  'slay'  means  to  analyze,  understand,  and  thus  to  en- 
force a  change  of  embodiment,  degree  and  manner  of  action. 
Do  this  sort  of  thing  'with  all  your  might,'  which  again  means 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  139 

'with  all  your  intelligence.'  '  Benign  wisdom  vibrated  in  that 
voice.  I  formed  a  strong  wish  to  see  its  source, — so  strong,  in 
fact,  that  I  must  have  swooned — for  I  experienced  that  strange 
yet  not  uncommon  phenomenon  of  a  dream  within  a  dream. 
In  this,  I  was  not  the  imprisoned  giant,  but  walked  on  the 
mountain  top,  the  clear  voice  leading  me  to  a  pool.  I  saw  no 
man,  and  surmised  the  voice  emanated  from  the  pool's  crys- 
taline  depths.  I  bent  over  its  brink  and  looked  within  it.  What 
a  reflection!  I  saw  a  face  unmistakably  possessing  miraculous 
wisdom.  If  /  had  it,  surely  I  would  not  have  remained  im- 
prisoned so  long.  It  could  not  be  myself!  With  a  pang  I 
realized  this  liberty  would  prove  the  transitory  privilege  of  a 
dream,  and  that  I  would  awaken  again  in  prison.  And  from 
the  pool  came  the  words:  "The  thought  must  lead  the  soul, 
and  the  soul  is  pioneer  of  the  embodiment!" 

"Who  are  you,  and  how  came  I  here?"  I  asked  in  a  sort 
of  desperation.  And  the  answer  was :  "I  am  You,  or  rather 
I  am  What  you  Will — your  ideal — at  this  time — Liberty.  The 
mind  becomes  like  unto  the  thing  thought  of.  Thinking  of 
me  in  terms  of  liberty,  your  mind  became  liberated.  Accord- 
ing to  its  fundamental  attractions  and  attitudes,  the  mind 
builds  or  with  equal  ease,  reconstructs  the  body  and  its  environ- 
ment. It  is  the  way  to  freedom.  Your  body  is  no  longer 
swollen  from  the  fight  of  prison  thoughts  and  freedom  actions. 
Go  re-inhabit  it  and  take  it  out  of  the  cave  with  you." 

There  was  a  great  lull,  a  long  hushed  pause,  as  tho' 
interminable  abysses  of  expanse  were  being  traversed.  I 
awoke, — still  under  the  rocks.  But  I  did  not  ponder.  A  flash 
of  the  great  remembrance  acted  like  an  instant  and  powerful 
spring.  Literally  I  catapulted  myself  out  of  the  cave,  leaving 
it  maybe  some  skin, — yet  glad  that  I  need  never  enter  such 
confinement  again.  There  was  a  shudder  perceptible  in  the 
air  itself,  and  all  but  visible  in  the  shrubs  and  among  the  rocks. 
Perhaps  the  sprites  knew  telepathically  that  their  master  was 
once  more  at  liberty,  and  that  a  new  order  would  now  come 
into  being  among  them. 

In  the  first  flush  of  this  great  boon  of  freedom,  being 
weak  from  lack  of  food,  I  seemed  for  a  moment  to  experi- 
ence a  kind  of  hysteria.  I  cried  wildly  into  the  air:  "O  how 
may  I  most  adequately  thank  and  worship  You?" — and  at  once 


140  PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

there  was  an  unmistakable  reply:  "By  eating!  Whatsoever  is 
necessary,  that  do  with  all  your  intelligence."  I  ate  some  nuts, 
herbs,  and  fruit,  and  drank  water  from  a  neighboring  spring. 

I  knew  now  that  I  should  have  to  bring  myself  to  a  test. 
My  strength  was  growing  within  me.  I  decided  to  summon 
all  the  tribes  I  had  seen,  and  to  organize  them  into  a  corps  of 
intelligent  and  obedient  servants.  No  sooner  had  the  echoes 
of  my  resolute  call  died  down,  than  from  rock,  shrub,  furrow 
and  cliff,  came  trooping  the  legions  of  sprites.  Their  advance 
guards  approached  as  if  to  offer  me  advice.  From  habit  born 
of  captivity,  I  was  about  to  listen  to  them,  and  immediately 
the  would-be  advisors  began  miraculously  to  grow  in  size. 
Then  I  remembered  some  of  the  things  said  to  me  by  the 
Voice,  and  abruptly  called  a  halt.  I  commanded  them.  I 
could  hardly  believe  myself, — yet  I  commanded  them.  And  it 
even  seemed  a  familiar  thing  to  do, — an  establishment- within 
myself,  obscured  for  a  short  time,  'tis  true,  but  more  ancient 
within  me  than  the  prison  habit  of  listening  to  the  vagaries  and 
whinings  of  my  mind.  As  I  commanded,  I  saw  just  a  shadow 
of  a  diaphanous  golden  chain  entwine  the  entire  legion  ever 
so  lightly,  yet  securely,  and  the  controlling  reigns  to  these 
chains  I  noted  ended  in  two  places,  my  chest  and  my  head. 
There  was  something  yet  to  learn,  I  felt.  There  was  some- 
thing sinister,  like  a  problem  a  child  dreads  and  yet  knows 
will  be  solved  when  it  becomes  an  adult, — there  was  some- 
thing of  that  kind  in  the  feelings  I  had  while  viewing  my  re- 
organized legions.  Especially  was  this  so  with  the  tribe  pos- 
sessing bodies  of  wild  animal  suppleness  and  perfection — the 
U3s,"  and  to  some  extent  also  with  the  sentimental  "4s." 

Suddenly,  I  recalled  that  all  that  was  transpiring  might 
have  an  every-day  human  application.  What,  for  instance, 
was  meant  by  the  mountain  imprisonment?  The  best-inten- 
tioned  of  people  are  sometimes  desperately  unsuccessful.  Had 
I  but  experienced  a  dramatization  of  the  subconscious  mind 
during  any  given  period  of  such  incapacity?  Surely!  It  may 
mean  more;  it  certainly  had  not  meant  less!  The  tendencies 
and  energies  which  in  synthesis  are  Mind,  there  I  had  seen  just 
as  active  and  powerful  as  ever,  but  split  and  disorganized. 
Commonly  underlying  many  failures  in  life,  there  is  a  care- 
fully nursed  "blanket"  suggestion.  Whether  it  is  denied  or 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL  141 

called  by  pretty  names,  it  amounts  always  to  Selfishness  and 
Negligence.  Before  they  fail,  such  people  are  concerned  in 
sensuously  experiencing  "What  Will  Come"  to  them.  They 
are  keen  on  "What  Fate  Has  In  Store  For"  them.  They  buy 
horoscopes.  They  refer  unfortunates  to  Jesus,  or  to  a  philos- 
ophy, instead  of  aiding  them.  They  forget  completely  the 
evolutionary  law  which  says:  "Your  fate  of  tomorrow  has  in 
store  for  you  exactly  what  you  stored  in  it  today  by  the  qual- 
ity of  your  thought  and  your  treatment  of  the  other  fellow." 
Theirs  is  the  blanket  suggestion  of  negligence  and  selfishness, — 
the  worst  weakener  and  disorganizer  of  the  subconscious.  Each 
subconscious  tendency  ceases  work  for  the  unified  purpose,  and 
becomes  a  leach.  Powers  wane.  Lack  of  ease,  or  "dis"-ease 
ensues.  No  longer  united  in  its  energies,  the  subconscious  can- 
not reconstruct  fundamentally,  but  garnishes  the  disorder  with 
a  concealment  of  fables  and  lies,  pose  and  neurosis.  The 
subconsciousness  of  the  oyster  so  builds  the  pearl,  as  a  pro- 
tection against  the  invading  and  irritating  grain  of  sand.  The 
sprites  offered  you,  while  you  were  satisfied  to  remain  no 
stronger  than  they,  to  flower  and  jewel  your  mountain  prison, 
but  they  did  not  volunteer  to  remove  it.  "Remember  you  have 
to  direct  and  control  the  mind,  instead  of  listening  to  and 
obeying  its  vagrant  and  conflicting  trends." 

I  remarked  that  I  was  well  cognizant  of  the  law  of  Sug- 
gestion. "Yes,  you  have  learned  laws.  But  witness  in  all 
human  laws,  for  instance,  in  the  securing  of  property  and 
possessions,  there  is  one  underlying  thing,  which,  if  understood 
and  applied,  places  the  person  above  and  beyond  the  reach  of 
their  penalties,  and  that  is  Integrity,  or  real,  whole-souled  hon- 
esty. So  with  the  law  of  Cause  and  Effect,  working  in  and 
thru  psychology  as  everywhere  else.  Observe,  if  the  deepest 
Cause  animating  one  is  directed  by  just  as  deep  laid  a  Sug- 
gestion of  an  ideal, — and  if  that  ideal  is  Liberty  thru  Control 
and  Unity  of  Mental  Purpose, — then  all  the  petty  effects, 
detriments,  accidents,  inadvertencies,  sicknesses  and  misfor- 
tunes,— in  short,  the  confinement  of  the  giant  under  a  moun- 
tain of  inertness,  need  never  occur.  That  mountain  to  many 
people  is  physical  disability  today;  they  need  to  hear  and  heed. 
To  a  great  many  more,  that  mountain  is  a  psychic  prison, 
composed  of  those  concrete  boulders  more  commonly  known 


142  PSYCHOLOGY—  PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 

as  creeds,  dogmas,  convictions,  biases,  greeds  and  prejudices. 
They  need  to  hear  and  heed  even  more;  they  can  never  be 
physically  well  while  they  are  mental  cripples." 

I  began  to  consider  what  I  should  now  do  with  my 
"legion."  I  had  "mustered  my  forces,"  —  and  now  must  engage 
in  some  great  task.  It  seemed  that  this  great  work  would 
have  to  do  either  with  removing  the  mountain  of  my  former 
imprisonment,  or  probably  with  building  a  road  so  that  there- 
after it  could  be  easily  scaled.  In  fact,  I  made  this  point  the 
topic  of  a  question.  I  heard  the  Voice  replying,  hardly  audible 
now,  but  yet  quite  distinct:  "You  are  both  to  scale  it  and  at 
the  same  time  to  remove  it.  Living  and  your  life's  work  will 
both  be  features  in  this  process." 

"But  what  in  very  truth  is  this  mountain?  Is  it  of  quartz, 
and  shale,  and  lava,  as  it  appears  to  be?" 

And  the  reply  was,  "Mainly,  it  is  composed  of  Ignorance." 

Then  what  —  yes  WHAT!  A  block  away  thru  the  trees 
came  the  noise  of  a  trolley  car  clanging  on  its  way,  and  the 
honking  of  automobiles.  I  had  awakened. 


What  would  I  not  have  given  for  a  reply  to  just  one  more 
question  !  Those  sprites  —  and  in  a  golden  harness  again,  — 
what  possibilities  was  one  to  read  into  this  symbol?  And  was 
there  anything  impossible?  But  I  was  hopelessly  wide-awake 
now,  and  arose  to  leave  the  park.  Once  or  twice,  as  I  saun- 
tered home,  there  occurred  to  me  an  enumeration  of  a  sort, 
which  I  had  compiled  for  myself  as  an  aid  in  my  early  studies. 
I  used  to  "play"  that  it  tabulated  the  octaves  thru  which  I 
fancied  energy  is  made  to  transform  by  evolutionary  effort. 
I  do  not  know  if  it  should  be  of  any  importance  in  this  con- 
nection. It  ran,  if  I  remember,  somewhat  in  this  fashion: 


PSYCHOLOGY— PERSONAL  AND  ESSENTIAL 


143 


Name    (a) 
and  Symbol   (b) 

Nature    therein 
is  enforcing 

In      the      "present" 
human  this  often 
appears    as 

//    can    be   trans- 
formed  into 

1. 

a. 

Inertness. 

Response  to  stimuli. 

Heaviness    or    lazi- 

Sub stantiality     or 

h. 

Mineral. 

ness. 

"well  -  grounded- 

ness." 

2. 

a. 

Passivity. 

Organization     and 

The   "human   vege- 

Systematizati on  — 

b. 

Plant. 

diverse    forms. 

table"     attitude. 

Aptness     in     form 

Blind  submission. 

and  technique. 

3. 

a. 

Appetite. 

Mobility;       senses; 

Debauch     and     Re- 

Ductile   and    tract- 

a. 

Passion. 

intelligence    thru 

morse. 

able  energy  —  for 

b. 

Animal. 

selfishness. 

healing,  etc.    Basis 

of  the  vital  aura. 

4. 

a. 

Emotion. 

Self-direction; 

Selfish  elation  coun- 

Refined,     Magnetic 

b. 

Human. 

V7olition  — 

teracted   by  selfish 

Charm.      Incipient 

Individuality. 

depression. 

(tho'  often   decep- 

tive)       clairsen- 

5. 

tience. 

a. 
b. 

Reason. 
Human 

Powerfully    organ- 
ized thought.    Ani- 

Capacity for  conse- 
cutive thots,  them- 

Ability,  means   and 
position  of  benefit 

("to  be"). 

mal  selfishness  was 

selves      no      more 

to  others  than  self. 

a   tool,   now  to  be 

than       anxieties  ; 

Self     disregarding 

discarded. 

and  this  only  when 

intellect    and   gen- 

one's own  welfare 

ius. 

is  concerned. 

6. 

Balance;    Poise, 

a. 

Ideal. 

Relinquishment     o  f 

Selfish     piety;     the 

Highest  degree  of 

(not  your 

mechanism    in   fa- 

exploded  orthodox 

human     enlighten- 

mental 

vor   of    principle. 

conception      of      a 

ment. 

picture 

god  acting  unlaw- 

Illumination. 

of  it). 

fully. 

b. 

Human 

("to  be"). 

7. 

«. 

Abstraction. 

Sacrifice  of  all   de- 

Sacerdotal twaddle; 

A  method  of  trans- 

b. 

Human 

sire  —  poisonous  be- 

Agnostical twaddle; 

cension.      Gradua- 

("to be"). 

fore      this      stage. 

or  — 

tion   from  the  hu- 

Such  "sacrifice"  is 
cause  of  neurosis 
with  students  who 
over-estimate  their 
"grade." 


Nothing. 


man  into  a  super- 
human cycle  of 
evolution. 


YC   15740 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


